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Anthony Kennedy’s retirement puts vulnerable red state Democrats in awkward position

By Emily Jashinsky
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Anthony Kennedy’s retirement puts vulnerable red state Democrats in awkward position

The Supreme Court was already at issue in the 2018 midterms before Justice Anthony Kennedy announced his retirement. Now it’s going to force a difficult vote.

Democratic senators running for re-election in red states, depicted by their opponents as partisan obstructionists, have worked to shore up their centrist bona fides. You can bet re-election was on the minds of Sens. Joe Donnelly, D-Ind., Heidi Heitkamp, D-N.D., and Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., when they bucked their party and became the only three Democrats to vote in favor of Justice Neil Gorsuch’s confirmation last year.

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