We are just hours away from President Trump nominating his choice to replace Anthony Kennedy on the High Court. We all know that the immediate bellyaching on the progressive side of the aisle will put whoever President Trump picks just south of Hitler on any number of things.

One thing that is overlooked, though, is the battle outside the Senate to influence public opinion. This can be critical to those red state Democrats who just so happen to be on the ballot this November.

Literally hours after Justice Kennedy stepped down, groups were already lining up for this battle to help Trump confirm someone who had not yet been named.

From The Independent…

Major conservative donors have announced plans to spend millions of dollars over the following weeks in a campaign to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy with a far-right judge, similar to Justice Neil Gorsuch.

Americans for Prosperity — a political advocacy group that’s part of the Koch network — said it would lobby for a conservative to fill the newly-opened Supreme Court seat, almost immediately after Mr Kennedy announced his retirement.

“We’re prepared to commit seven-figures to support a nominee in the mould of Gorsuch,” a spokesperson for the organization said in a statement to NPR. “Someone who will interpret the law as written, and not legislate from the bench.”

This follows the pattern in what was ultimately the successful effort to approve President Trump’s first nominee to the Supreme Court, Neil Gorsuch.

In that 2017 fight, according to the Washington Post, the conservative forces wiped out the progressive ones by a huge margin.

By a nearly 20-to-1 margin, conservative groups have vastly outspent their liberal counterparts on television advertising on behalf of Gorsuch, according to Republican estimates of ad purchases since the end of January.

Also, there will be a fight in those states that Trump won big in 2016 that have Democrats running for re-election this year as also noted in the Post article from last year.

In Montana and North Dakota, where Democratic Sens. Jon Tester and Heidi Heitkamp, respectively, face reelection next year, more than 99.5 percent of all media money spent on the Supreme Court confirmation fight has gone toward supporting Gorsuch.

Even if the Democrats don’t have the money to burn on THIS court fight, they will make this as difficult as possible to pass anyone no matter their qualifications. Which is a shame but a legacy of the Bork nomination in the late 80’s.

On to the show at 9 pm EDT.