Republicans won’t budge on Obama’s high court nominee

Published 8:15 pm Wednesday, March 16, 2016

Senate Republicans are not budging in their refusal to consider President Obama’s nominee to the Supreme Court after the president officially named Merrick Garland for the job.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell insisted Wednesday that the Republican choice not to consider Garland — the chief judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit — was nothing personal.

“The American people may well elect a President who decides to nominate Judge Garland for Senate consideration. The next president may also nominate someone very different,” McConnell, R-Ky., said Wednesday. “Either way, our view is this: Give the people a voice in the filling of this vacancy.”

House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., said he fully supports that stand. “We should let the American people decide the direction of the court,” he said Wednesday.

In the immediate aftermath of Garland’s nomination Wednesday, McConnell’s GOP troops were toeing the same line. Moderate Republican senators who are up for reelection in swing states this November said that the choice of Garland did not shift their thinking about not holding confirmation hearings for the judge.

“I continue to believe the Senate should not move forward with the confirmation process until the people have spoken by electing a new president,” said Sen. Kelly Ayotte, R-N.H.

“After the election, I look forward to considering the nominee of our new president,” said Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio. “Whether the American people elect a Republican or a Democrat, I will judge his or her nominee on the merits, as I always have.”

The hardline Republican stance has sparked a passionate outcry from Democrats, who have accused Republicans of shirking their constitutional duty to consider the president’s nominee. Democrats are expected to make the Supreme Court nomination an issue for individual Republican senators on the campaign trail. Administration officials hope that if vulnerable Republican senators face enough pressure, they may try to force leaders to reconsider their resistance.

Senate Democrats are counting an early political victory in the fact that about a half dozen Republicans haven’t completely ruled out meeting with Garland and considering his nomination, according to various reports. That list includes Sens. Susan Collins, Maine; Jeff Flake, Ariz.; James Inhofe, Okla.; Mark Kirk, Ill.; Ayotte and Portman.

“The ice is cracking. It’s going to crack further,” said Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y.

Flake said Wednesday that he would meet with Garland because “I think that’s my responsibility,” adding that he “would certainly prefer a pick like Garland, rather than someone Hillary Clinton might put up” if she wins the election.

Democrats also stressed that Republicans should be happy with a moderate nominee like Garland — and some Senate Republicans suspect Obama selected him over someone younger or more liberal to pressure Republicans to move his nomination.

“I think he was really trying to pick somebody that he thought at least some Senate Republicans would accept right now,” said Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, a member of the Judiciary Committee who was one of the Republicans who voted for Garland when he was nominated to serve on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals.

But the current environment is too “toxic” and “politicized,” Hatch said, to consider confirming any Supreme Court nominee before the next administration.

“It isn’t the person — Judge Garland’s a good man,” Hatch said, adding that he has “respect” for Garland and “fought for him” back in 1997. “But this is different.”

Hatch said he was willing to at least talk to Garland now that he’s Obama’s nominee — a step many other Republican senators haven’t been willing to take.

But conversations aren’t confirmations, and so far, Republicans have remained united in refusing to give Garland a formal hearing.

Judiciary Committee Chair Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, has been firm in stating that his committee will not hold confirmation hearings for Obama’s nominee.

Speaking on the Senate floor Tuesday, Grassley said “the next Supreme Court justice could dramatically change the direction of the court” and Americans deserved to “weigh in” before that happens.

Garland does have a track record of support from some Republican senators. When he was confirmed to the federal bench in 1997, seven sitting GOP senators supported him: Hatch, Dan Coats, Ind.; Thad Cochran, Miss.; Collins (Maine), Inhofe, John McCain, Ariz., and Pat Roberts, Kansas.

At least one of those senators is refusing to dismiss his Supreme Court nomination out of hand.

“Judge Garland is a capable and accomplished jurist,” Collins said, noting that she will “look forward” to meeting with him, as she has done with all Supreme Court nominees. Collins is one of the few Republicans who has declined to join the Republican boycott.

But others in that group are already refusing to consider Garland’s nomination as a matter of principle.

“The right thing to do is to give the American people a voice in the selection of their next Supreme Court justice,” Coats said Wednesday. “The next president, with input from voters in the upcoming election, should fill the current Supreme Court vacancy.”

Garland is no stranger to long, drawn-out confirmation processes. Then-president Bill Clinton initially nominated him to the bench in 1995, but his candidacy got mired in a bitter dispute fueled by Grassley, who wanted to reduce the number of seats on the D.C. bench. It would take until March 1997 before the Senate voted to confirm Garland’s appointment, 76 to 23.