Mitch McConnell knows that if he can place Amy Coney Barrett on the Supreme Court, his party can lose the presidential election, but still win the GOP’s long-term battle to shift policy to the hard right. Barrett would create a 6-3 court majority that is archconservative on social issues and a corporate rubber stamp on economic issues — and that majority could permanently alter American jurisprudence.

That’s why McConnell on Friday made clear that he is not deterred, even by a deadly pandemic.

Even though there is a coronavirus outbreak in the US Senate and the White House, and even though Barrett’s nomination announcement may have been a super-spreader event, Republicans are still refusing to delay the confirmation hearings. Indeed, even though current Senate rules do not permit remote voting and require senators’ physical presence in a potential COVID hot zone in order to achieve a required Senate quorum, McConnell seems determined to force a confirmation vote in that hot zone.