Time to prep for loud and direct protest of Coons and Carper gutlessness
Today DL contributors will visit the Wilmington office of Senator Chris Coons and hand deliver the letter below. It will be signed by members of the DL direct protest subgroup.
I’m sure we will all be keeping a close eye on Senators Coons and Carper’s actions over the next few weeks. If they lose their nerve (as some reporting suggests they are considering) we must act.
The political action group Network Delaware has stood up a strategic nonviolent organizing committee. Please comment below if you will be willing to take part in some protest action against Coons and/or Carper if they vote for the Gorsuch nomination to progress to the full Senate. – Thanks
24 March 2017
Senator Coons,
We write you today in light of incredible and extraordinary circumstances. Under more stable political conditions we may understand your desire to strike some sort deal in the matter of the nomination of Judge Neil M Gorsuch to the Supreme Court. However, I think you would agree that this is not a stable and safe political environment. Considering Merrick Garland was not even given a proper hearing from your committee we strongly urge you to resist any effort to confirm Judge Gorsuch. This includes not providing your vote for cloture and voting no on confirmation should the filibuster be broken.Yesterday Politico reported that unnamed Democratic sources said that after minority leader Schumer announced a filibuster on this matter you were part of a group “of senators seeking a solution that would avoid” said filibuster. If this report is accurate we respectfully request you cease this approach.
We appreciate that this requested course of action could be described as “obstructionist.” This is unfortunate but necessary. The federal government is quickly deteriorating into a dangerous embarrassment. Total obstruction is the only appropriate response. This is what we expect.
More generally we encourage you to reflect on where this is going and what your role will be in it. Eventually, a hard line must be drawn. We suspect this fact hasn’t escaped you. Would you rather be a leader in this regard or turn up late to the party having to explain yourself?
Best regards,
“All of this is happening in the richest and freest country in the world… The subtle and deadly change of heart that might occur in you would be involved with the realization that a civilization is not destroyed by wicked people; it is not necessary that people be wicked but only that they be spineless.” –James Baldwin, ‘The Fire Next Time’, p. 55
This is happening. Like a coiled spring, I think we can get a large number of commitments from concerned Delawareans to turn up at noon in the plaza of 1105 N Market St on the day in April that we here of Carper or Coons vote to break the filibuster.
Three of us meet with two of Coons’ aides this afternoon. We delivered the letter and pressed the case. I walked out with one of the staffers (I think it was Andrew Dinsmore – very affable fellow). When we got to the plaza outside I said, “yeah, this place looks like it’ll hold 100-150 people.” He said they’d only ever had maybe a dozen demonstrators. I said well, if it comes to that, we’ll see if we can do something historical….
One of the groups working with us on this has asked me to reformat the letter you wrote as a petition.
https://www.change.org/p/senator-chris-coons-urge-senators-carper-and-coons-to-support-the-filibuster-of-neil-gorsuch?recruiter=173292169&utm_source=share_for_starters&utm_medium=copyLink
Saw the email. Thanks. Yeah, feel free to use it.
I signed the petition. Ready to join any protests that are upcoming.