Election 2020 showed Republicans that it pays to be bold

Katherine Beck Johnson is Research Fellow for Research and Policy Studies at Family Research Council. This article appeared at The Washington Examiner on November 10, 2020.

Voters proved the Senate Democrats wrong by reelecting the vast majority of senators who had voted to confirm Justice Amy Coney Barrett.

The Democrats had ominously warned their Republican colleagues there would be severe consequences come election time if they backed Barrett. Such warnings were unfounded, as a majority supported her confirmation in polls, and most were reelected.

Several Republican members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Sens. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Joni Ernst of Iowa, and Thom Tillis of North Carolina, which oversaw the Barrett hearings, were up for reelection. As chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Graham in particular refused to back down, despite threats from the Left.

Senators Graham, Ernst, and Tillis were all told their support of Barrett’s nomination would make them vulnerable to defeat. Senators Graham and Ernst won their respective elections, and Tillis is currently on the path to victory.

This is in spite of the Democrat’s unprecedented efforts to unseat Graham by spending a record-shattering $57 million on his opponent, Jaime Harrison. Graham won with 54% of the vote, proving that South Carolinians support his bold leadership of the Senate Judiciary and want him to continue being bold for the next six years.

Sen. Mitch McConnell has been the boldest of all. He led the Senate to hold Justice Scalia’s seat so President Trump could fill it with the originalist Justice Gorsuch. McConnell then led the fight for Justice Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation, not once flinching or succumbing to the pressure from Democratic senators who tried every tactic to stop the confirmation.

McConnell once again proved his bold leadership by advancing Barrett’s confirmation days before the election. The outcome of these bold actions was three new originalist justices and McConnell’s landslide reelection. McConnell’s opponent, Amy McGrath, raised over $84 million in an attempt to unseat McConnell but fell flat in Kentucky.

Sen. Susan Collins’s reelection is yet another example that exposes the Left’s false narrative. Many on the Left described her deciding vote for Justice Kavanaugh as a “betrayal.” They poured millions of dollars into her opponent Sara Gideon’s campaign. Even though Gideon raised more money than almost every other senate candidate in the nation, Mainers gave Collins another term, proving they did not mind her vote on Kavanaugh nearly as much as the Left told us they did.

It’s high time the liberal mob stopped claiming to speak for the American people. Senate Republicans should ignore the Democrats’ fear-mongering and empty threats.

When Republicans take bold action, the voters reelect them. The confirmation of Justice Barrett was a bold and entirely constitutional action by Senate Republicans.

The bold and fearless actions of the Republicans will leave a legacy for many years to come. Three originalist justices on the Supreme Court will help to ensure that the American people decide what policy to set and that the judge’s role is only to interpret that law as written. Not only is this important at the Supreme Court, but lower courts as well.

In the last four years, the Senate confirmed over 200 judges that Trump nominated. The Republican Senate was able to make major strides towards securing many of our courts. These will uphold the Constitution for many future election cycles.

For the past four Senate election cycles, the American people have made it known that they like what the Republican senators are doing by keeping the Senate in Republican hands. In the coming years, while the Republicans maintain control of the Senate, they should remember that the voters reward bold action with reelection.