The Feinstein Fade Out and How It Bolsters the Swamp

If you’re looking for evidence that politicians seated in the highest elected offices in America are little more than public facades for the powers behind the scenes that control them, you don’t have to go much further than the unfolding drama that is aged Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA). The 89-year-old senator finally returned to Washington in May after a three-month absence for being hospitalized in early February. Her staff has confirmed that she suffered brain inflammation from a bout with the shingles. By all accounts, she is wholly incapable of performing her senatorial duties.

‘They Push Her Wheelchair, Remind Her How She Should Vote’

Feinstein is constantly surrounded by a “phalanx of aides” as she struggles to make her way around Capitol Hill, The New York Times reported May 28. “They push her wheelchair, remind her how and when she should vote and step in to explain what is happening when she grows confused,” the paper related.

The situation has gone from tragic to pathetic to something worse: a punchline.

“At times she has expressed confusion about the basics of how the Senate functions,” The Times noted. “When Vice President Kamala Harris was presiding over the chamber last year in one of many instances in which she was called upon to cast a tiebreaking vote, Feinstein expressed confusion, according to a person who witnessed the scene, asking her colleagues, ‘What is she doing here?’ Staff members have been overheard explaining to her that she cannot leave yet because there are more votes to come.”

There is no plausible way that Senate Democrats can pretend an addled Feinstein serves the interests of the people of California. But that is precisely the point - and it is hardly limited to Democrats.

In March 2020, Liberty Nation detailed the underhanded tactics Republican establishment figures relied on to wring one more six-year term out of Sen. Thad Cochran (R-MS) in 2014 despite unmistakable signs that Cochran was suffering from dementia:

“[A] Republican establishment spearheaded by Henry Barbour, nephew of powerful GOP insider Haley Barbour, conducted a brutally hostile campaign against [populist GOP primary opponent Chris] McDaniel and even canvassed black Democrats in the state to cross over and vote for Cochran in the GOP runoff election. Cochran won ...

“After being re-elected, Cochran continued to deteriorate physically … A 2017 Politico article depressingly relates how unfit for office the man was.

“‘Cochran had to be guided by staffers around a security checkpoint inside the Capitol,’ the article relates. ‘He started to walk into a first-floor room – though the Senate chamber is on the second floor. He was then ushered by an aide up to the Senate.’

“At another point, he voted ‘yes’ on an amendment at an Appropriations Committee despite an aide telling him to vote ‘no.’”

The situation eerily echoes that of Feinstein today. Does anybody believe that Thad Cochran and Dianne Feinstein are such gifted statesmen/women that they are irreplaceable, even in the throes of severe illness? Or is that “phalanx of aides” running the office on both occasions deemed essential by the Swamp ruling apparatus?

Controlling the Feinstein Succession

Cochran’s health deteriorated to such a degree that he was forced to step down in early 2018. It appears likely that the same fate awaits Feinstein. This points to another slap at the American people’s right to choose their representatives. If Feinstein resigns, California Democrat Gov. Gavin Newsom gets to appoint her replacement. Though the position will only be temporary, the advantages reaped in the 2024 battle for a full six-year term would be enormous.

When Cochran exited, Mississippi Republican Gov. Phil Bryant tabbed state Agriculture Commissioner Cindy Hyde-Smith to fill his seat before a special election was held. The move gave her a huge leg up on all other Republican challengers in the red state. Hyde-Smith managed to win the special election and then ran unopposed in the 2020 GOP primary as she secured a full six-year term.

A similar scenario may play out in blue California. The trio of Democrats vying to succeed Feinstein now find themselves at the mercy of would-be kingmaker Newsom.

If Feinstein calls it quits, Newsom will get to appoint both of the Golden State’s US senators. He chose Sen. Alex Padilla (D-CA) to fill Harris’ Senate seat when she became VP in 2021. Reps. Barbara Lee (D-CA), Katie Porter (D-CA), and Adam Schiff (D-CA) have announced 2024 runs to replace Feinstein. Newsom had pledged to nominate a black female for any future vacancies after selecting Padilla, and Lee supporters are pressing him to keep that promise should Feinstein bow out.

“The behind-the-scenes sniping [in Democrat circles] has turned nastier,” dominant media organ NBC News reported May 27.

“Lee supporters accuse Schiff and his so-called establishment allies, like [Rep. Nancy] Pelosi [D-CA], of manipulating the ailing Feinstein to stay in office to block Lee, which they have denied. Pelosi says she wants to let Feinstein make her own decision, seeing sexism in the push to force her to retire. Feinstein's allies have pointed to men in similar health who weren't pushed out of the Senate.”

Schiff and Porter backers, meanwhile, “argue that Newsom would unfairly be putting his thumb on the scale of the primary by elevating Lee, a less well-known lawmaker from Oakland, [giving her] a critical boost in statewide name recognition and the power of incumbency,” the network explained.

The bottom line in the Feinstein saga is that keeping a rapidly fading soon-to-be nonagenarian elected official in office long past her expiration date has allowed the machinery of insider establishment politics to heavily sway the process of choosing her successor. Given the extraordinary advantages of incumbency, this could have multi-decade consequences. It’s just another way that the Swamp keeps itself ensconced in power.