MSNBC "Hardball with Chris Matthews" - Transcript: Supreme Court
Interview
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MATTHEWS: He said it.
And now with the retirement of Anthony Kennedy, President Trump is set to appoint his second justice to the high court. And that could have, of course, massive implications.
For years, opponents of abortion have been leading a campaign against the right to choose in courtrooms across the country. It could just a matter of time before one of those cases reaches the Supreme Court.
Joining me right now is Democratic Senator Maria Cantwell of Washington State, and Alexis McGill Johnson, a Planned Parenthood board member and the executive director the Perception Institute.
I want to talk to the senator first.
Just generally, you have been confronted with this staggering news that the vacancy sits there, number five on a nine-person court, right in the middle.
SEN. MARIA CANTWELL (D), WASHINGTON: Unbelievable.
I think the most important thing about this whole thing is that the president`s views are out of the mainstream of the American public. So the question is, is the president going to insert his views, or is he going to consult with Congress on what are the mainstream views of America on this particular issue?
MATTHEWS: What did you make of his talk about
CANTWELL: Horrible.
MATTHEWS: It`s a little weird to talk about even. What did he mean by some form of punishment? That`s a little imaginative.
CANTWELL: The fact that he took this pledge during the campaign and said that he is going to appoint nominees that believe this, so he`s not for holding up the privacy rights that now have been well-established and supported by many courts.
He`s basically saying, I`m going to roll that back. And so now he has an opportunity to really put his thumb on the scale to make that difference, we have to do everything possible to make sure that that doesn`t happen.
So, his views are not in the mainstream. And that`s the case that we need to take to every member of the United States Senate. You`re willing to change what has now been accepted as policy. In our state, it`s been codified into state law.
Maybe we will have a campaign in every state in America to show people that we are going to fight for these privacy rights.
MATTHEWS: Well, Ronald Reagan picked Justice Kennedy. And Justice Kennedy basically believed in the Casey case. He said there could not be -- and the essential right of a woman to choose an abortion, the right to choose, to make the decision, must be protected, and there will be no undo burden put on her.
Like, you can`t -- you got to do this one minute after midnight. No tricks. No undue burden. He said none of that.
CANTWELL: Right.
And so the point is that you have now this libertarian judge now being replaced by a president who is showing authoritarian tendencies.
MATTHEWS: Mike Pence tendencies.
CANTWELL: Authoritarian. So, he`s like, it`s my way or -- and this is the way
MATTHEWS: Can you stop this? Can you slow it down to -- here`s my hope. You can slow it down until after the voters vote, so you can throw this to the people this fall, so they can have a say in this thing.
CANTWELL: We`re going to throw it to them right now.
These privacy rights that are so important across the board are things that have now been well-established and in the penumbra. What We`re going to point out is that this president, if he`s getting his list from the Federalist Society or the Heritage Foundation, is supporting textualists.
That`s it. And a textualist means they`re not going to agree that these privacy rights, whether it`s your right to privacy at home, whether it`s your right to privacy on the Internet, whether it`s your right to privacy as a woman, that they are going to support the penumbra that is in the Constitution.
That`s the fight we are going to take to the people. And that`s where we`re going to ask our colleagues on the other side of the aisle to make sure that they`re supporting those privacy rights as well.
MATTHEWS: Thank you, Senator, very much. Thank you very much for coming.
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