Report: Gorsuch Nominated Only After Netanyahu Declined Role

Conway predicted that if Netanyahu faces trouble at home as a result of several ongoing criminal corruption probes, he might change his mind.

Washington, February 1 – Trump administration insiders reported today that Neil Gorsuch, a federal judge nominated to fill the vacant seat on the Supreme Court, was only asked to accept the appointment after Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu told the president he was not interested in the position.

Unnamed officials told PreOccupied Territory this morning that while Gorsuch will make a fine Supreme Court justice, President Trump had hoped to lure Netanyahu to the bench. The two heads of government reportedly discussed the position in a phone call two weeks ago, when the Israeli premier confirmed he preferred to remain in his current office.

“Bibi would have been a good fit with the president’s and the GOP’s political ideology,” explained one White House official. “And you just know what his position would be on the Zivotofsky case,” he added, referring to a decision last year that allowed the Obama administration to continue instructing the State Department not to print “Israel” as the country of birth for citizens born in Jerusalem.

For now, say officials, Netanyahu will likely decline any other roles offered by Trump, not the least because some of the juicier positions have already been filled. “I think he would have made an excellent Secretary of State,” lamented Kellyanne Conway. “And Secretary of Defense would also suit him. Secretary of the Treasury would be less obvious, but also more than reasonable – when Netanyahu was Minister of Finance back in the day, the Israeli economy did well. The only other reasonable possibility was Ambassador to Israel, and that’s in good hands already.”

Conway predicted that if Netanyahu faces trouble at home as a result of several ongoing criminal corruption probes, he might change his mind. “If push comes to shove, maybe he’d even accept a position as cultural attache to some nothing country such as Namibia. I’m sure he’s keeping his options open just as the president is.”

The Council on American-Islamic Relations, after initially informing journalists it would release a statement on the reports, ultimately let them pass without comment. A spokesman for the organization told reporters that its leadership eventually gave up trying to tie the story to Trump’s restrictions on travelers from certain Muslim countries. “It would have been too confusing to seem we were suddenly in favor of the ban if we said Bibi should be blocked because he’s from Muslim Palestine,” he remarked. “I mean, we’re not generally consistent, and our hypocrisy is legion, but we do try to be coherent.”

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