The Jackson hearings were an opportunity for the GOP. They didn't take it.

Republicans had an opportunity with Jackson’s nomination to do the right thing. The votes for her confirmation are all-but assured. They could have used this as an opportunity to repair division in a time of war, compete for Black voters and, frankly, signal that the arc-bending party of Lincoln still exists.

But Republicans didn’t take that opportunity. Instead, the worst of Jackson’s critics tried to turn her unique strengths and qualifications into deficits. They smeared her as “soft on crime” to counter the positive that she would be the first justice in American history to bring the expertise of a former public defender. They wrongly cast her as a coddler of child pornography offenders, undermining her bipartisan, consensus-building experience as Vice Chair of the U.S. Sentencing Commission.

Why would Republicans do this when Jackson’s confirmation would not upset the current 6-3 conservative-leaning tenor of the Court? My guess is that dividing and conquering to win elections at any cost have become muscle memory for far too many members of Congress. They don’t remember or don’t care to follow the bipartisan norms of civility that used to result in highly qualified candidates like conservative Antonin Scalia (98-0) or liberal Ruth Bader Ginsburg (96-3) being handily confirmed.