The Wall Street Journal’s editorial board ripped Sen. Jeff Flake for keeping the Senate from confirming conservative judges, and said voters would remember that if he ever runs for president.
Flake, R-Ariz., has said he’d vote against President Trump’s nominees in committee and on the Senate floor unless the Senate votes on a bill to protect special counsel Robert Mueller. But the Journal said Flake’s “stunt” would only delay the appointment of conservative judges.
“Mr. Flake’s stunt will have zero effect on President Trump or Mr. Mueller, and he’s compromising a substantive principle to make a futile political gesture,” the board wrote. “Mr. Flake is hurting the cause of confirming conservative judges who would enforce the Constitution in the name of a bill that is unconstitutional.”
The Journal predicted that if Flake is planning to run against Trump in 2020, he’d have a hard time explaining his move to voters.
“Republicans are likely to notice that he put his personal feelings about Mr. Trump above confirming judges that any GOP President would be proud to nominate,” it wrote.
“Mr. Flake’s self-indulgence is another example of how hostility to Mr. Trump has caused so many people to lose their own political bearings,” it added.
