Sen. John Cornyn (R., Texas) is recommending his colleague Sen. Cory Booker (D., N.J.) take his rhetoric down a notch about Supreme Court justice nominee Brett Kavanaugh and his supporters.
Booker railed against President Donald Trump's choice to replace Anthony Kennedy in a press conference on Capitol Hill on Tuesday, characterizing those not fighting against Kavanaugh's confirmation as "complicit in the evil."
"I’m here to call on folk to understand that in the moral moment, there is no neutral," Booker said. "In a moral moment, there is no bystanders. You are either complicit in the evil, you are either contributing to the wrong, or you are fighting against it."
Booker continued with a reference to Psalm 23: "We are walking through the valley of the shadow of death. But that doesn’t say, ‘Though I sit in the valley of the shadow of death' ... I am calling on everyone right now who understands what's at stake, who understands who Kavanaugh is. If someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time. He has shown us who he is."
Cornyn said remarks like Booker's were "unhinged" and "detached from any reality" during a Senate floor speech.
"My advice to some of our friends across the aisle who are engaged in this kind of superheated rhetoric, my advice is get a grip," he said. "Get a grip."
He repeated the advice later in an interview with the Washington Post.
"What in the world? [Booker] needs to get a grip," he said. "Everybody’s trying to outdo everybody else."
Democrats are struggling to form a cohesive message against Kavanaugh's confirmation. Republicans hold a slim majority at 51-49, but The Hill reports attacks on his rulings and views on health care and abortion haven't made headway with the GOP's more moderate members.