RUSH: Meanwhile, even before President Trump’s COVID news, Dianne Feinstein and every other Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee were demanding that Amy Coney Barrett’s confirmation hearing be delayed. Just as we predicted. The minute I heard that they were gonna go ahead and allot weeks for hearings, folks, I got a bad feeling about this. We just do not learn, and it’s not even that.

We, of course, learn. Lindsey Graham cannot possibly be ignorant about what the Democrats’ intentions are here. We don’t need to do any hearings. This whole thing has got to happen before the election! You know, this came up in the debate the other night, and Trump sort of mangled it, if you ask me. It’s not this complicated. He was elected president in 2016 for four years.

We have an opening in the Supreme Court that is occurring within those four years. The American people spoke. They elected Trump largely on the basis of his Supreme Court list of potential justices. He made it a big part of the campaign in 2016. To say that Trump is not entitled to make this pick because it’s so close to an election is nothing more than a Democrat delay tactic.

He, of course, is entirely entitled to make this pick, constitutionally. There’s two things about it, and that’s it. The president names the justice; the Senate has a role to play, advice and consent. The Republicans run Senate. If their advice is, “We’ve got the votes to pass the nominee; we don’t need to do any hearings,” then there’s the consent, and we can be done with this.

Now, no. Now we’re gonna do hearings, and now we’re gonna do this and that, and we may not even finish until October 22nd, and we gotta have this or that happen. Now there’s even, “Mitch McConnell will not even guarantee there will be a vote before the election.” I said, “What the hell’s going on?” “Well, he’s in a tight battle in Kentucky.” So what? Man, this is big, this judicial nomination.

This may not come our way again, this opportunity, because if this woman is not confirmed before the election, you can kiss it good-bye. She’s not gonna be confirmed after the election. “What, Rush, even if Trump wins?” If Trump wins, they’re gonna do everything they can. It depends on what happens in the Senate. But you don’t want to take the chance.

We’ve got an opportunity here to get this woman confirmed, legally, politically, whatever way you want to analyze this. The legals and the constitutionality are all on our side. Now here come the Democrats demanding a delay. Even before Trump gets COVID-19, they’re demanding a delay. The process, they say, is “too hurried to properly vet Amy Coney Barrett.” No, it’s not!

The woman has been vetted three years ago. They put her through the indignity of this three years ago for her nomination to the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. All of this was so predictable. It was damned predictable this was gonna happen.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Now, at about 1:14 this afternoon, sometime in the 1 o’clock hour today, Politico ran a story. The headline of the story: “McConnell Vows ‘Full Steam Ahead’ on Barrett as Fears Rise of Virus Outbreak —

“Sen. Mike Lee, a key Republican on the Judiciary Committee, announced he had tested positive for the coronavirus.” So here’s the guts of the story: “Lindsey Graham is scheduled to begin hearings for Barrett on Oct. 12,” ten days from now, “and is planning to hold a committee vote on the nomination on Oct. 22. In his statement, Lee said he planned to quarantine for 10 days and expected to be able to provide support for Barrett in the committee.

“‘I have spoken with Leader McConnell and Chairman Graham, and assured them I will be back to work in time to join my Judiciary Committee colleagues in advancing the Supreme Court nomination,’ Lee said.” I’m still looking for the part of this story where McConnell says it’s “full steam ahead.” McConnell, appearing with appearing with Hugh Hewitt on the radio today, said “that he has yet to choose a date for the final floor vote, but that Democrats will be unable to delay Barrett’s confirmation.

“But fallout from the pandemic is largely out of his control.” Ohhhh, see? “‘Our biggest enemy, obviously, is … the coronavirus, keeping everybody healthy and well and in place to do our job,’ he said. [The Turtle] said that portions of Barrett’s confirmation hearings are likely to be conducted remotely … he was not yet sure whether senators who met with Barrett and the White House officials had contracted the virus.”

So I’m still looking for part of the story, “McConnell vows ‘full steam ahead,'” but don’t see it in the story. “I have spoken with Leader…” (muttering) Well, I’ll trust your word for it, ’cause the headline says he “vows ‘full steam ahead.'” I don’t know. I don’t see any evidence of “full steam ahead.”

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Here is Paul in Elmont, Michigan. Great to have you. I’m glad you waited, sir. Hello.

CALLER: Hello, Rush. It’s actually Belmont near Grand Rapids and —

RUSH: I’m sorry. It says “Elmont” up there. My bad.

CALLER: I understand. I’m reacting to something you said in the last hour regarding whether Amy Barrett would actually — her confirmation vote would — come up before the election or not. Specifically, I think what you said was McConnell couldn’t promise that it would because he’s in a tight race, and I understand tight races and the importance of his winning reelection. But what I would say is if you try to equate the importance of his reelection with the importance of getting ACB confirmed and on the Supreme Court, there’s just no comparison, and it’s one of the most asinine things I think I’ve heard in a long time.

RUSH: Well, you’re running two things together. Let me… I heard somewhere this morning doing show prep… Either somebody on Fox was saying it or I read it somewhere, and it was my first red flag that went up. It was that Senator McConnell was suggesting that there may not be a vote on Judge Barrett before the election — and that’s the first I’d heard of that.

I said, “What the name of Sam Hill! What am I missing?” and I didn’t hear any more than that. Then later, I had heard when I was running this by some other people, “Did you hear this?” somebody said, “Yeah, he’s got a tight race going on in Kentucky.” So I then mentioned that.

I don’t know that that’s why there’s not gonna be a vote on her. That’s what somebody said to me. I’m sorry I didn’t make that clear. And then The Politico came out with a story in the 1 o’clock hour which said the exact opposite of all this, that McConnell is prepared to move ahead with the vote. So here’s the problem for me.

The problem is that when I heard — and I wish I could remember. I got too much stimuli here. I got too much coming at me at one time, and sometimes if I don’t stop and make a note of who I heard say something or where I’m reading it, then all I’ve got is my memory of what I heard. I heard somebody say… It was either me or it might have been videotape of McConnell himself saying, “We may not get to a vote here before the election.”

It might have been a story on the whole idea of getting things done before the election, and I just stopped what I was doing and red flag went up, ’cause I can totally believe that (sigh) about Republicans, and I wish I didn’t. But The Politico piece that came out, and I’ve now put it at the bottom of the Stack here. (shuffling papers) Politico piece came out the 1 o’clock hour and I think I might have just stumbled across it here.

“McConnell Vows ‘Full Steam Ahead’ on Barrett as Fears Rise of Virus Outbreak.” So apparently what I heard earlier this morning bothered a lot of people, and it caused the Turtle to go out there and clarify what’s going on. But I’m telling you: There doesn’t seem to be a sense of urgency about this; I don’t care what these people are saying. I don’t think there needs to be hearings.

The woman was vetted three years ago. She’s already put up with Dianne Feinstein insulting her Catholicism. This is a train wreck waiting to happen. We have proven that we don’t know how to stop these train wrecks when they start. Kavanaugh was on the verge of being confirmed, and then here comes Blasey Ford’s letter that Dianne Feinstein just miraculously was able to produce — and it stopped everything.

They started workin’ on Jeff Flake, a Republican senator, to stop and get another FBI investigation. Then here came every one of the damn lies about Kavanaugh running rape trains and spiking the punch and all this stuff, and not a shred of it was true. We had to go through two to three weeks of it, and the idea that Democrats are not gonna do it again is ludicrous.

We run the Senate!

We control the Senate!

We have the votes to get this judge confirmed!

I don’t mean to sound hysteria here. But it just ticks me off when history starts repeating itself when it’s so unnecessary. We have the votes to get her confirmed. We don’t need to do hearings. If we’re gonna do hearings, we do ’em for two days. But I tell you, if you open the door to hearings, then the Democrats are coming along and they’re already asking for delay.

Not enough time.

Not enough time.

Dianne Feinstein says not enough time.

What an absolute crock.