Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) said the Democratic Party is “the party of opposition” on Wednesday and stated her commitment to fighting tooth and nail to prevent President Donald Trump’s “terrible” cabinet picks from being confirmed.
“Democrats have the minority in the House, the minority in the Senate. But that does not make us the minority party,” Warren said in an interview with MSNBC. She added, “We are the party of opposition, and that is our job. But our tools are very limited. We don’t have the capacity to stop Jeff Sessions if all the Republicans lock arms.”
Warren’s statement arrived hours after Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) voted to stop her from reading remarks from 1986 that were critical of Attorney General Jeff Sessions (R-AL) on the Senate floor that stood in violation of Senate Rule XIX, with her characterization of Sessions as a disgrace to the Justice Department.
McConnell told presiding officer Sen. Steven Daines (R-MT) that Warren, an attorney and Harvard Law School professor, “impugned the motives and conduct of our colleague from Alabama as warned by the chair. Senator Warren, quote-said, ‘Sessions has used the awesome power of his office to chill the free exercise of the vote by black citizens.’ I call the Senate to order under the provisions of Rule XIX.”
Daines ruled that Warren was out of order, and the Senate voted 49-to-43 for sustaining the ruling of the chair, followed by a 50-to-42 vote preventing Warren from continuing her floor speech:
Tonight @SenateMajLdr silenced Mrs King's voice on the Sen floor – & millions who are afraid & appalled by what's happening in our country.
— Elizabeth Warren (@SenWarren) February 8, 2017
Sessions was confirmed as President Trump’s first attorney general on Wednesday with a 52-to-47 vote. Sen. Sessions voted “present.”
Also on Wednesday, Betsy Devos addressed the Department of Education for the first time since being sworn in as Trump’s education secretary the day before.
Vice President Mike Pence cast a historic vote to break the Senate’s 50-50 vote for Trump’s controversial nominee.
“We just don’t have the votes to be able to stop them if all the Republicans stick together and vote through these terrible nominees,” Warren told MSNBC of Devos.
“And that, in fact, is exactly what they are doing. They are cramming terrible nominees down the throats of the American people.” Warren added that the Democrats’ tool is “the grassroots” America. “It’s the people who say, ‘Wait a minute, this is too far. No, we cannot do this in America.'”
The day after Warren was silenced, former Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) took the Senate floor to read the 1986 letter Coretta Scott King wrote opposing Sessions’ nomination to a federal judgeship:
Thank you @SenSanders for reading Coretta Scott King's letter on the Senate floor. It is powerfully important. https://t.co/3VMZuE8tdp
— Elizabeth Warren (@SenWarren) February 8, 2017
Senators Tom Udall (D-NM), Sherrod Brown (D-OH), and Jeff Merkley (D-OR) also read King’s letter from the Senate floor without rejection from Republicans.
Warren took to social media in a series of tweets to reaffirm her commitment to opposing the Republican Party:
Thanks to you, everyone now knows the concerns that Coretta Scott King had about Jeff Sessions. Concerns that millions of people still have.
— Elizabeth Warren (@SenWarren) February 9, 2017
There’s no Rule 19 to silence me from talking about Jeff Sessions anymore. So let me say loudly & clearly: This is just the beginning.
— Elizabeth Warren (@SenWarren) February 9, 2017
If Jeff Sessions turns a blind eye while @realDonaldTrump violates the Constitution or breaks the law, he'll hear from all of us.
— Elizabeth Warren (@SenWarren) February 9, 2017
If Jeff Sessions makes even the tiniest attempt to bring his racism, sexism & bigotry into @TheJusticeDept, he'll hear from all of us.
— Elizabeth Warren (@SenWarren) February 9, 2017
And you better believe every Senator who voted to put Jeff Sessions’s radical hatred into @TheJusticeDept will hear from all of us, too.
— Elizabeth Warren (@SenWarren) February 9, 2017
Consider this MY warning: We won’t be silent. We will speak out. And we WILL persist.
— Elizabeth Warren (@SenWarren) February 9, 2017
Hours after Warren attempted to use the words of Martin Luther King Jr’s widow to smear Sessions, a video surfaced showing the late Coretta Scott King praising Sessions at the Rosa Parks Library and Museum in December 2000.
Furthermore, in an interview with Neil Cavuto on Fox Business Network this week, Dr. Alveda King, niece of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., said Warren used King’s named to “play the race card.”
“It’s almost like a bait and switch, stir up the emotions, in the name of King—and my name is Alveda King … [and] play the race card, which she was attempting to do.”
“In that letter [Coretta Scott King] would be referring to some of [Sen. Jeff Sessions] comments. However, she would agree today that he, of course, ended some [school segregation and] he worked to prosecute members of the KKK.” She added, “Our family—we are peacemakers, we bring people together. … We do not divide people.”
Follow Adelle Nazarian on Twitter and Periscope @AdelleNaz.
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