Public Affairs

"It's always been governed by norms and those norms don't exist anymore"

The North 103.3 | By Lisa Johnson

Published September 21, 2020 at 1:45 PM CDT

2020 continues it's relentless series of challenges; the latest, the death of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on Friday at the age of 87.

In March of 2016, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) refused to hold a hearing for then-President Obama's nominee for the Supreme Court, saying voters should decide which presidential candidate should pick the new justice.

In a statement coming just over an hour after Ginsburg's death was announced, McConnell vowed to bring to a vote whoever President Donald Trump nominates.

Dr. Cindy Rugely, the head of UMD's Political Science department, joins us this morning to talk about what's legal, what's ethical, and what's been left up to "we the people."

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Lisa Johnson

Lisa Johnson started her broadcast career anchoring the television news at her high school and spinning country music at KWWK/KOLM Radio in Rochester, Minnesota. She was a reporter and news anchor at KTHI in Fargo, ND (not to mention the host of a children's program called "Lisa's Lane") and a radio reporter and anchor in Moorhead, Bismarck, Wahpeton and Fergus Falls.Since 1991, she has hosted Northland Morning on KUMD. One of the best parts of her job includes "paying it forward" by mentoring upcoming journalists and broadcasters on the student news team that helps produce Northland Morning. She also loves introducing the different people she meets in her job to one another, helping to forge new "community connections" and partnerships.Lisa has amassed a book collection weighing over two tons, and she enjoys reading, photography, volunteering with Animal Allies Humane Society and fantasizing about farmland. She goes to bed at 8pm, long before her daughter, two cats, or three dogs.

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