Delaware Democratic Sen. Chris Coons said Sunday that he would be open to expanding the Supreme Court on CNN’s “State of the Union.”
Coons seemingly said that his position on the issue was contingent on whether Judge Amy Coney Barrett was confirmed to the Supreme Court.
“Like Joe Biden, I’m not a fan of expanding the court,” he told CNN’s Jake Tapper. “But we have a few weeks here to see whether there are four Republicans who will step back from this precipice,” Coons said.
Coons also said that Republicans were rushing Barrett’s confirmation in order to overturn the Affordable Care Act, a point frequently echoed by other Democrats as well. A case regarding the legislation is set to be argued before the court on Nov. 10.
“[Republicans are] doing this to get someone on the court just in time, a week after the election, to take critical health care protections from a majority of Americans, [and] we need to focus on that,” Coons said.
“And then if we happen to be in the fact pattern where we have a President Biden who will have to look at what the right steps are to rebalance our federal judiciary,” he added. (RELATED: Biden ‘Has Not Dodged’ Court Packing Question, Campaign Co-Chairman Says)
The Senate Judiciary Committee is set to vote on Barrett’s confirmation on Oct. 22, and if successful, the confirmation will move to a full Senate vote.
Biden has mostly evaded answering the question of whether he favors expanding the Supreme Court, though he said last week that he was “not a fan” of doing so. He said that he would announce his official position on the issue before the election on Nov. 3 during a town hall Thursday night.
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