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Opinion: Partisan Divide Will Result in Supreme Court Vacancies Staying Vacant

Legal writer Linda Hirshman challenges the assumption that the next president will hold great power over the Supreme Court's makeup. The partisan divide is so deep in Washington that it may be impossible to get Supreme Court nominees confirmed, Hirshman says in this Washington Post opinion piece. The consequence would be that judgments of the lower circuit courts of appeal would stand in case the Supreme Court justices were evenly divided. That would favor liberals because of the "wealth of recent Democratic appointments on the lower courts," Hirshman opines, and also because "much of the conservative heartland is marooned in blue circuits."