Women Sharing Videos Reading Coretta Scott King’s Letter to Support Elizabeth Warren

The U.S. Senate on Tuesday, in a procedural vote, cleared the way for confirming President Donald Trump’s nomination of Senator Jeff Sessions to be the next attorney general. Warren: “I thought quoting Coretta Scott King’s letter… was absolutely relevant”.

People were also using #letlizspeak in response to the actions of the Senate, including King’s own daughter Bernice.

“The American people deserve to hear how Jeff Sessions is an extremist who will be a rubber stamp for this out-of-control Trump presidency”.

Silencing Senator Warren for reading Mrs. King’s letter under the guise of following Senate Rules is hypocritical, and rightfully leads many to question whether the Majority Leader has a different standard of expected conduct for female Senators compared to their male counterparts, like Senators Cruz and Cotton. Tom Udall, D-N.M., and Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio on Wednesday morning. King wrote that the Alabama Republican had used his then-position as a US attorney to intimidate elderly black voters. Mr Trump has lashed out on Twitter at Democrats stalling his cabinet picks, including Mr Sessions, who is only the sixth of Mr Trump’s 15 nominees to be confirmed. Democrats are under intense pressure from their liberal base to challenge the entire Trump agenda, especially his nominees.

“It was the judgment of Coretta Scott King, widow of slain civil rights leader Martin Luther King, that [Sessions] used the office of the United States attorney for Alabama to, quote, these are Coretta Scott King’s words, ‘chill the free exercise of the vote by black citizens.’ End quote”, Udall said. Now, more than 30 years later, the Senate is debating on whether to elevate him to an even more powerful position.

“The senator has impugned the motives and conduct of our colleague from Alabama as warned by the chair”, said McConnell.

According to Politico, the Republican-majority voted 49-43 to prevent Warren from talking on the chamber floor until Sessions’ nomination is over.

In response, Warren expressed her surprise that King’s words should be considered a “violation”.

“Senator Warren was giving a lengthy speech”, he said after the vote. She was given an explanation.

But his career was nearly derailed in 1986 when a Senate panel rejected his nomination for a federal judgeship amid concerns over past comments he made about blacks, and over remarks that Democrats called sympathetic to the Ku Klux Klan. “Kennedy…although I would be glad to repeat it in my own words”, said Warren, referring to remarks she read earlier from late MA senator Ted Kennedy. Edward Kennedy of MA, and had been warned to stop.

Sen. Sanders called for McConnell to apologize, and pledged, “This is a fight we will continue”.