Live from Music Row Monday morning on the Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed Tennessee (R), Sen. Marsha Blackburn, to the newsmakers line.
During the third hour, Blackburn outlined today’s proceedings in the Senate for the confirmation of Amy Coney Barrett while discussing how the left has personally attacked conservative women in America today and throughout history.
Leahy: And now, here is Senator Marsha Blackburn. She has a very busy day. Welcome to the Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy and Crom Carmichael. Good morning, Senator Blackburn.
Blackburn: Good morning. I am absolutely delighted to join you.
Leahy: It’s a big day in American history. How do you feel about this vote? What time do you think the vote to confirm Amy Coney-Barrett will be held in the Senate today?
Blackburn: I think we’ll get around to it about seven o’clock tonight. That’s the start when the 30-hour clock will expire. Now. There is an outside chance that they will yield back some of their time earlier in the day. If they do we’re ready for that because we’re ready to take the vote. And then I will head down to the White House as soon as I vote. And the president should be swearing her into the Supreme Court tonight
Leahy: Tonight? Wow. That is that’s fantastic.
Carmichael: Now, let me ask you a couple of procedural questions. You all held a vote yesterday. Can you describe what that vote was and why it’s so important in terms of the timing and the scheduling?
Blackburn: Yes. It is the cloture vote is what it’s called, and we invoked cloture and started the 30-hour clock for 30 hours of debate. And that is why that would expire at about seven o’clock tonight. But Crom as you remember during Kavanaugh I think out of frustration they yielded back at 25 hours and the vote was taken. So we don’t know if they’re going to take all 30 hours or not. But here’s the thing.
They have been so disrespectful of Judge Barrett. And Judge Barrett and the chairman and the process. They did not even show up for the committee vote because they thought they were going to be able to stymie us and would keep her from getting out of committee. Every Republican showed up. The chairman went ahead and called the committee to proceed. We agreed to proceed even though they chose not to show up.
There were no surprises on this. They knew exactly when we were going to meet. But instead of coming what they did was to bring pictures of people they had talked about regarding the Affordable Care Act. Well, we voted her out of committee. Then Chuck Schumer has proceeded to offer adjournment resolution after adjournment resolution to keep this vote from taking place. So people are saying why did they oppose her?
So the reason they opposed her is she is a pro-life, pro-family, pro-religion, pro-business female. She comes from the center-right of the political spectrum. And the left and the mainstream media have no use for women who are conservatives because they will not submit to the leftist agenda. And whether it is Judge Barrett or me or other conservative females that are out there, they will try to pound you into submission to that agenda and they’re not able to do it. So what do they do? They become angry and then they start the politics of personal destruction and tried to knock and ridicule you.
Carmichael: Senator, what you’re touching on right now is exactly right, but I’m going to expand it a little bit. In addition to the things that you just said to describe yourself you also have very very strong economic free-market and pro-America views and you are able to articulate your support for all the things that you hold dear. Amy Coney Barrett is similarly a very very strong woman from an intellectual standpoint.
And as was Clarence Thomas. And Clarence Thomas is a Black man and he’s not a woman but he also has very very strong views that he can articulate. And it’s been my observation that the Democrats are just simply scared to death of women and people of color who have strong views that are different than theirs. Because while they can’t defend their views you can defend yours. And so they’re just simply scared of you.
Blackburn: Well, yes. You know what they do, and I actually talked about this on the floor last night when I gave my wrap-up remarks. I said it is so disappointing to me instead of choosing a diversity of viewpoints and having point-counterpoint our friends on the left have decided they are going to lock in on intellectual isolation. They do not want the discussion. They do not want the point-counterpoint.
They have let this devolve to the point that it has become a cancel culture. And Crom, we see it in our high schools. We’re seeing it in our colleges. We see it in the public square. We see it in social media. If you are not in lockstep like The Stepford Wives of liberalism. If you are not in lockstep, then they will shut you up. They will try to slice you and dice you slice you cut you up and shut you up. And they do it time and time and time again.
Carmichael: Now, what is the Genesis? I’ve got I’ve maintained for a year since Michael has had me on his show, I’ve maintained for a year that the root cause of cancer in the Democrat Party and the underlying cancer is the government employee unions. And all of the power and all the money that they get in the Democrat Party, as a result, it is the party of government. It’s not the party of the people. How do you respond to that?
Blackburn: Well, I think it’s I think that the SEIU and the government unions are the implementers of this agenda. But like I wrote in my book that just came out, The Mind of a Conservative Woman. You go back into the women’s movement in the 70s in you’re going to find the Genesis of a lot of this. And they wanted to promote and push forward women that would agree or ascribe to a leftist agenda. Much of it had to do about abortion.
Much of it had to do about worker rights. Or as they would say fairness in the workplace. Much of it had to do about government control. Look at what the Democrats did in 2012 with the story of the life of Julia with the Obama Campaign where Julia depended on the government from the time she was a little girl at three years old until she retired at 63 years old.
And the whole thing was mocked and ridiculed. But we have to realize that is how they see the process. And they want to control your healthcare. Your education. Where you live where you work and what you do for your work. And then have you dependent on the government for your retirement. Well, generally we call that socialism.
Leahy: Senator Blackburn, if I can follow up on the vote coming up today. The cloture vote yesterday was 51-47 I believe. Lisa Murkowski has said she’s going to change her vote to be in favor of the nomination.
Blackburn: Correct.
Leahy: By my calculation, it looks like it’ll be 52-46. Is that kind of what you think is going to happen later today?
Blackburn: Yes. Yes. We think that is where we are with the vote. And we think that is how we will end up today. Those of us that are on the Senate Judiciary Committee, of course, have spent our entire October working on this.
Leahy: Working on this and working diligently. Senator Blackburn a very busy schedule today on a day of a historic vote. Thank you for joining us today. And please come back again.
Carmichael: Very informative.
Blackburn: Absolutely.
Listen to the full third hour here:
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to the Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
Photo “Marsha Blackburn” by Marsha Blackburn Facebook. Photo “Amy Coney Barrett” by University of Notre Dame. Background Photo “Supreme Court” by deadlinedd CC BY 2.0.
