(LifeSiteNews) – U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein, remembered by Catholics and pro-life conservatives for her infelicitous statement to Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett, “The dogma lives loudly within you,” referring to the mother of seven’s Catholic faith, has died at age 90.
The long-serving, far-left California Democrat passed away during the night in her Washington, D.C. home.
In the hours since her death, Democrats and corporate media have painted a picture of Feinstein as a “centrist” with a “tendency for bipartisanship” who “was known for trying to find common ground with Republicans.”
“There are few women who can be called senator, chairman, mayor, wife, mom and grandmother,” wrote James Sauls, Feinstein’s chief of staff, in a press release. “Senator Feinstein was a force of nature who made an incredible impact on our country and her home state.
“In San Francisco, she showed enormous poise and courage in the wake of tragedy, and became a powerful voice for American values. Serving in the Senate together for more than 15 years, I had a front row seat to what Dianne was able to accomplish,” President Joe Bien said in a statement. “Dianne made her mark on everything from national security to the environment to protecting civil liberties. She’s made history in so many ways, and our country will benefit from her legacy for generations.”
“She was smart. She was strong. She was brave,” said Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, paying tribute to Feinstein from the floor of the Senate chamber. “She was compassionate, but maybe the trait that stood out most of all was her amazing integrity — her integrity was a diamond.”
Conservatives, however, remember an establishment politician who was often an aggressive force for the far left on Capitol Hill.
In September 2020, Feinstein attacked a Catholic judicial nominee, Amy Coney Barrett, for her faith during a confirmation hearing, saying, “The dogma lives loudly within you.”
The radically pro-abortion senator’s comments caused a backlash for seemingly violating the Constitution’s prohibition of a “religious test” for public officials. Numerous memes mocked Feinstein for sounding like the Star Wars character Yoda.
“When you read your speeches, the conclusion one draws is that the dogma lives loudly within you,” Feinstein said. “And that’s of concern when you come to big issues that large numbers of people have fought for, for years in this country.”
“Feinstein’s comments this afternoon revealed that anti-Catholic bigotry is still alive in the U.S., even, and perhaps especially, among those leftists who are the first to decry prejudice and discrimination against other minorities,” National Review’s Alexandra Descantis wrote at the time.
Catholic University of America professor Chad Pecknold released a series of tweets blasting Feinstein’s “chilling” “anti-Catholic bigotry.” Others questioned whether a Muslim nominee would have received similar scrutiny.
A year later during her questioning of Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh, Feinstein was called out for dramatically inflating the number of maternal deaths from illegal, pre-Roe v. Wade abortions.
“In the 1950s and ’60s, the two decades before Roe, death from illegal abortions in this country ran between 200,000 to 1.2 million,” Feinstein claimed. “That’s according to the Guttmacher Institute. So a lot of women died in that period.”
But her statement was brazenly, catastrophically false.
Feinstein was citing a 2003 analysis from Guttmacher (a pro-abortion group that began as part of Planned Parenthood), which said 200,000-1.2 million is the range of abortions themselves, not abortion-related deaths, during the relevant period. The report in fact admitted that maternal deaths from these abortions were officially as low as 300 by 1950 and below 200 by 1965, though it suggests the “actual number was likely much higher” due to unreported or misreported cases.
In 2021, after the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization that ultimately ended up in the court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, Feinstein indicated that she didn’t believe a fetus could be considered a “human being” at 15 weeks old.
“I have been very steady and steadfast in supporting Roe. I believe in a woman’s right to choose,” said Feinstein, according to a report by Fox News’ Sam Dorman. “I believe that women should be able to control their own bodies, and that’s my belief.”
Feinstein, according to a tribute in Politico Magazine, is also remembered for “her leadership in helping usher LGBTQ citizens into America’s mainstream.”
“From her early days in San Francisco to congressional debates over gay marriage and participation in the military, she played a key role in centering LGBTQ rights as a national issue and a crucial value for Democrats,” according to Politico.
“From her time serving on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors with Harvey Milk to her battle to protect transgender service members, Dianne Feinstein has been a champion for LGBTQ equality and social justice,” wrote gay civil rights organization, Equality California, in a 2018 candidate endorsement. “Senator Feinstein stood with our community back when few others did.”
In October 2021, Feinstein proposed a bill that would prevent unvaccinated Americans from flying home for the holidays unless they showed proof of a negative COVID test or official documentation demonstrating prior recovery from SARS CoV-2.
The bill proposed that air travelers be required to present proof of having been “fully vaccinated” against COVID-19 in order to board a flight within the United States, and unvaccinated Americans must alternatively show that they have tested negative no more than 72 hours before their flight or recovered from the virus in the past three months.
Among those reportedly being considered to fill her seat before the next election are three California Democrats now serving in the U.S. House of Representatives: Adam B. Schiff, whose long-running claims that the debunked “Russia collusion” conspiracy theory launched by his party against President Donald Trump during the 2016 election; Barbara Lee, an advocate for funding elective abortions directly with taxpayer dollars through federal healthcare and insurance programs, and Katie Porter, who recently used her platform during a House Oversight and Reform Committee hearing to weaken the definition of pedophile, stating that it’s an identity rather than descriptive of both a heinous condition and criminal act.
Feinstein began her political career in San Francisco, where she was elected to the city’s Board of Supervisors in 1969, becoming its first female president in 1978. After San Francisco Mayor George Moscone and gay Supervisor Harvey Milk were gunned down at City Hall that same year, Feinstein became the city’s first female mayor.
She was elected to the U.S. Senate in 1992.
Feinstein graduated from Stanford University in 1955, earning a bachelor’s degree in history.
Married three times, Feinstein was preceded in death last year by her most recent husband, Richard Blum, a successful businessman whose wealth made her one of the richest members of the Senate.
She leaves behind one daughter, a granddaughter, and three stepchildren.