March 10, 2021

Senate Confirms Merrick Garland as US Attorney General

Caroline Brehman/Congressional Quarterly/Zuma

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.

The Senate overwhelmingly voted to confirm longtime federal judge Merrick Garland as US attorney general on Wednesday.

Garland was appointed to the Supreme Court by former President Barack Obama five years ago, but then-Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell refused to bring his confirmation to a vote in the Senate, claiming that it was too close to the end of Obama’s term. (That logic did not extend to the confirmation of Justice Amy Coney-Barrett after Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s death in the final months of Trump’s term.)

Today, McConnell was one of 70 senators to vote to approve Garland to lead the Justice Department. Among Garland’s first tasks could be investigating the January 6 attack on the Capitol—and former President Donald Trump’s role in inciting it. As my colleague Kara Voght reported last month, he’s also setting his sights on police reform and combating domestic terrorism.

WE'LL BE BLUNT:

We need to start raising significantly more in donations from our online community of readers, especially from those who read Mother Jones regularly but have never decided to pitch in because you figured others always will. We also need long-time and new donors, everyone, to keep showing up for us.

In "It's Not a Crisis. This Is the New Normal," we explain, as matter-of-factly as we can, what exactly our finances look like, how brutal it is to sustain quality journalism right now, what makes Mother Jones different than most of the news out there, and why support from readers is the only thing that keeps us going. Despite the challenges, we're optimistic we can increase the share of online readers who decide to donate—starting with hitting an ambitious $300,000 goal in just three weeks to make sure we can finish our fiscal year break-even in the coming months.

Please learn more about how Mother Jones works and our 47-year history of doing nonprofit journalism that you don't find elsewhere—and help us do it with a donation if you can. We've already cut expenses and hitting our online goal is critical right now.

payment methods

WE'LL BE BLUNT

We need to start raising significantly more in donations from our online community of readers, especially from those who read Mother Jones regularly but have never decided to pitch in because you figured others always will. We also need long-time and new donors, everyone, to keep showing up for us.

In "It's Not a Crisis. This Is the New Normal," we explain, as matter-of-factly as we can, what exactly our finances look like, how brutal it is to sustain quality journalism right now, what makes Mother Jones different than most of the news out there, and why support from readers is the only thing that keeps us going. Despite the challenges, we're optimistic we can increase the share of online readers who decide to donate—starting with hitting an ambitious $300,000 goal in just three weeks to make sure we can finish our fiscal year break-even in the coming months.

Please learn more about how Mother Jones works and our 47-year history of doing nonprofit journalism that you don't elsewhere—and help us do it with a donation if you can. We've already cut expenses and hitting our online goal is critical right now.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate