The Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday voted to advance President Donald Trump’s nomination of Judge Amy Coney Barrett to the U.S. Supreme Court. All Democratic members of the committee boycotted the vote, leaving photos of Americans whose healthcare coverage could be lost if a Court with Justice Barrett strikes down the Affordable Care Act. The committee’s own rules require members of the other party to be present in order for a vote to commence but in spite of the Democrats’ absence Republicans went ahead breaking the rule to vote 12 to 0 to advance Barrett to the full Senate. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said this at a press conference on the steps of the Capitol as the vote was being held. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who has refused to hold a vote on a Covid-relief bill has insisted on rushing through the nomination a week before the election. Meanwhile under pressure from the press to take a stand on whether he’ll add more seats to the Supreme Court, Democratic Presidential Nominee Joe Biden finally said he would establish a commission to study the issue. 

Commentators have pointed out that in addition to her troubling links to a homophobic private school, and many other issues, Barrett ruled in 2015 that a Black teenager in Indianapolis who suffocated to death when an officer handcuffed him while he lay on his front, did not have the constitutional right to breathe. Combined with another ruling where she decided that someone using the N-word as a racist epithet did not create a hostile work environment, means Barrett is likely to set back the cause of racial justice and equality by decades once she is on the Supreme Court. 

In other news, intelligence officials are claiming that Russia and Iran have access to U.S. voter registration data and are using it to send fake emailed threats. Director of national intelligence, John Ratcliffe and F.B.I. director Christopher A. Wray made the announcement on Wednesday evening and linked the recent report of voters receiving threatening emails proclaiming to be from the Proud Boys as having originated from Iran. Mr. Ratcliffe, who is a staunch Trump loyalist said that Iran’s aim was to hurt Trump politically by showing the Proud Boys hate group as supporting him. Democrats are skeptical of the claim and Iran’s government denied what it called “Malign and Dangerous” allegations. 

 Meanwhile Trump, who appears to be increasingly unstable as the election nears is now reportedly considering firing FBI Director Christopher Wray after the election, and is also apparently unhappy with one of his strongest allies, Attorney General William Barr. His anger at the two, based on White House sources speaking with the Washington Post, apparently lies with their reluctance to politically target Joe Biden’s son Hunter. 

As early voting continues in Florida, the Pinellas County supervisor of elections has reported a