A Petition to Senator Rick Santorum

This has been a delicate moment in our nation’s history, with Republican leaders of the United States Senate seriously considering an unprecedented change in rules to end the right of the minority to employ the filibuster in the debate on lifetime appointments to our federal courts.

And, while a bipartisan group of centrist Senators from both parties came together at the 11th hour to defuse the controversy and reach common ground, you instead chose to continue an established pattern of inappropriate and inflammatory statements by comparing Senate Democrats to Adolf Hitler on the floor of the U.S. Senate.

We, the undersigned, believed it was both hypocritical and short-sighted for Republican leaders to attempt to change Senate rules they themselves have employed to prevent previous presidential nominees from confirmation. But we also believe your verbal tirades have cheapened the public discourse on issues of critical importance to all Americans and have no place on the floor of the United States Senate.

Therefore we, the undersigned, urge you to issue a public apology to your colleagues and to the country – and in the future restrain yourself from making such inflammatory and insulting statements about your fellow Americans.