Hey, maybe Obama should use recess appointments to pack the courts before leaving office « Hot Air

Hey, maybe Obama should use recess appointments to pack the courts before leaving office « Hot Air: New York magazine has published a piece by Ed Kilgore titled “Here’s How Obama Could Go Nuclear on Trump and the GOP Before Leaving Office.” The gist of the piece is that the GOP has violated all historical norms in opposing Obama so Obama should do likewise and do something really crazy before he leaves office:

If Obama is indeed in the mood for a final act of defiance toward these vandals, what can he do? Last-minute regulations (apart from some hard-to-reverse environmental actions that he has already taken like offshore drilling bans that are issued for fixed terms) aren’t very fruitful; some can be simply revoked by Trump or his agency appointees, and others Congress can kill under the Congressional Review Act. Yes, he retains the power to pardon right up to the end, but that’s not going to place a more permanent Obama stamp on the public sector.

That leaves one potentially big stick in Obama’s rapidly shrinking arsenal: recess appointments of judges to fill scores of federal-bench vacancies — up to and including Antonin Scalia’s seat on the Supreme Court.

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