Rick Scott pushes partisan case for Amy Coney Barrett on Senate floor

U.S. Senator Rick Scott took to the Senate floor to hail the Supreme Court nomination of Amy Coney Barrett on Wednesday.

Barrett, President Donald Trump‘s third nominee, would fill the spot of liberal-leaning Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died earlier this year.

The first-term Senator, a Republican from Naples, has lauded Barrett’s character and competence, and he did not break from that glowing narrative on the floor of the Senate.

Scott said she would be a bulwark against “judicial activism,” a priority of the Democratic party.

“The Democrats only want judicial activists,” Scott said, noting that the party would not “engage in this process despite knowing she’s highly qualified.”

“Democratic attempts to attack Judge Barrett for her faith fell flat,” Scott said, leaving Democrats “grasping at straws” on how to attack her.

The Senator has expressed confidence that Barrett will have the votes for confirmation later this month, but whether because legitimately worried Republicans could wobble or because it is a key base mobilizer, Scott has called for conservative advocates to pressure his colleagues.

Scott, who is spending much of the stretch run “busting [his] butt” to help Republicans keep a fragile Senate majority as a bulwark against a Democratic House and potentially a change in the executive branch, has said it’s important to seat Barrett before what will likely be an election with a number of contested results and challenges to processes.

“My election in 2018 … they tried to change it through the courts,” Scott said earlier this month to Americans for Prosperity. “We can’t let that happen.”

Scott has said “elections have consequences” regarding these court picks, and has urged that balky Democrats need to “win more elections.” However, he has expressed fear of what those Democrats would do if they win the elections, with particular discomfiture over potential packing of the court.