All eyes are on the U.S. Senate’s Judiciary Committee as they are expected to vote Monday on the U.S. Supreme Court nomination of Colorado appeals court Judge Neil Gorsuch which will clear the way for a full Senate vote on Friday in what many are calling a “showdown” between Democrats and President Donald Trump who nominated Gorsuch to replace the late Justice Antonin Scalia who died last year.

Ever since President Trump nominated Gorsuch, Senate Democrats have vowed to stop at nothing in denying Gorsuch’s nomination, but the numbers appear to show a different story. To date, three Senate Democrats have broken ranks and have gone on record in support of Gorsuch, angering fellow Democrats who have threatened to attempt to block Gorsuch by using a filibuster to enforce the 60-vote threshold for high-court nominees. A filibuster is an obstructive tactic that either party can use prevent a Senate vote from taking place. The filibuster dates back to the 1850s, according to Wikipedia.

But Senate Republicans see the Gorsuch nomination in a different light. They say Gorsuch will be confirmed by the U.S. Senate when and if it is necessary for Senate Mojority Leader Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) to call for a vote to change the rules from the 60-vote margin to a simple majority of 51 votes. This move has been referred to as the “nuclear option.” Currently, the Senate has 52 Republicans to 46 Democrats with 2 Independents for a total of 100 senators.

“Judge Gorsuch will be confirmed this week one way or another depending on the Democrats,” McConnell said on FOX News Monday morning. McConnell led Republicans last year in unjustifiably refusing to hold hearings on then-President Obama’s pick for replacing Scalia on the bench, which has left the court without its 9th member for many months. 

Meanwhile, Senate Minority Leader Sen. Chuck Schumer called Gorsuch’s confirmation “highly unlikely.”

According to TV news reports, Gorsuch has 55 votes which would put him over the top if McConnell changes the rules to allow confirmation with 51 or more votes and not the current 60-vote threshold.

The normally liberal USA Today newspaper has endorsed Gorsuch due to his qualifications and lack of any scandals.

“Gorsuch’s credentials are impeccable: Columbia, Harvard, Oxford, federal and Supreme Court clerkships and a decade on the federal appeals bench. He received a ‘well-qualified’ rating, the highest available, from the American Bar Association,” stated the Editorial Board of USA Today on Sunday. “On principles and independence, he has gotten an array of glowing references, including from some Democrats and liberals. Extensive vetting has unearthed no hint of personal scandal.”

For most Americans this process of presidential nominations for either the U.S. Supreme Court or cabinet positions, confirmation hearings followed by a full Senate vote is not easy to understand. This process leads to distrust of government and political gridlock in Washington. It’s easy to see the 60-vote margin for high-court nominees is no longer relevant and it needs to be permanently rolled back to 51 votes mainly because to win the presidency only takes a simple majority of Electoral Votes, which President Trump won last November in defeating Democrat Hillary Clinton. When no one is above the law why should it take a higher standard to fill a Supreme Court vacancy then it does to elect a president? Those 100 U.S. senators represent all American citizens. 

In an unrelated matter, last Friday, President Trump walked out of an executive-order-signing ceremony in the Oval Office apparently in disgust over reporters firing questions at him that had nothing to do with rolling back international trade agreements and attempting to turn the event into a heated press conference. The president did not take the bait and instead left the room.

The video-taped incident has made mainstream media’s headlines all weekend, analyzed by left and right political commentators and spread all over social media as if the incident was somehow important, but it wasn’t. Instead, the executive orders were signed by President Trump behind closed doors in the company of those people invited to the ceremony out of reach of White House reporters who clearly got out of line by taking verbal potshots at President Trump and attempting to take advantage of the situation.

This behavior by mainstream media will only go so far until their access to the President of the United States is curtailed. For those reporters who showed such disrespect in the Oval Office President Trump is sure to blacklist them from future events.

Britt Nelson relocated to Costa Rica in 2011 from Florida, where he served as news editor for the Palatka Daily News, a newspaper owned by the New York Times Regional Newspaper Group (NYT-RNG) for 20 years.

Nelson served the NYT-RNG for 18 years in Tennessee, Kentucky, Virginia, North Carolina and Florida as a correspondent, reporter, staff writer, senior staff writer training new reporters, copy editor, page designer, editorial writer, editorial page editor and editorial board member.