Politics: Sen. Dick Durbin, who says Republicans have shoved attorney general nominee Loretta Lynch to the "back of the bus," once filibustered and opposed the GOP nominations of black and Latino appeals court judges.
Last week, Durbin accused Republicans of forcing Lynch, President Obama's African-American nominee to replace Eric Holder, to "sit in the back of the bus" until a vote on a controversial sex trafficking bill could be held.
That thinly veiled reference to the moment in 1955 when Rosa Parks refused to move from her seat in a Montgomery, Ala., bus was meant to paint Senate Republicans as racists. This came as news to Tim Scott, R-S.C., the first black elected to the Senate from the Deep South since reconstruction.
"It is helpful to have a long memory and remember that Dick Durbin voted against Condoleezza Rice during the 40th anniversary of the March (on Selma)," Scott noted.
"So I think, in context, it's just offensive that we have folks who are willing to race-bait on an issue as important as human trafficking."
Rice was the first African-American woman, and only the second woman, to serve as secretary of state. Durbin opposed her views on the Iraq war, which Durbin said were "just plain wrong." Opposition to Rice, who succeeded Colin Powell, was Durbin's privilege, but by his standards he was a racist for doing so.
Durbin also opposed the nomination of Miguel Estrada, President George W. Bush's U.S. appeals court nominee. Estrada was described in a Nov. 7, 2001, borderline-racist staff memo to Judiciary Committee member Durbin as "especially dangerous, because he has a minimal paper trail, he is Latino and the White House seems to be grooming him for a Supreme Court appointment. They want to hold Estrada off as long as possible."Read the rest of the srory HERE.
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