Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid told “Meet the Press” that he thought the Republican facade against Garland would break, because some Republican senators already have said they would be willing to meet Garland and one Republican has said there should be a vote. McDonough was on ABC and Fox, while Reid was interviewed on NBC. Apparently, he thinks he can persuade GOP senators to consider his Supreme Court nominee with an implicit threat to expose them as hypocrites, obstructionists and revanchists if they refuse. “And there’s going to be a breakthrough here”, he said. Black women are a crucial part of the progressive coalition, and there are plenty among that cohort who would be excellent choices, including Attorney General Loretta Lynch and U.S. District Court Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson.
Advertisement
Will’s disagreement with the GOP’s just-say-no approach to Garland is especially significant because Will’s own view of the Constitution places him well to the right of the late Justice Antonin Scalia, who Garland hopes to replace.
Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) has suggested he would be open to meeting with Garland and has said that, if a Democrat were elected President in November, he would want the Senate to consider Garland’s nomination during a post-election, lame-duck session.
In a report from Think Progress, Mitch McConnell is quoted as saying that no new Supreme Court Justice will be picked until the National Rifle Association (NRA) approves of the nominee.
“The fact-checking website Politifact has found such claims wanting, writing: “‘Tradition’ [is] not consistent with judicial history. “This is Republicans wanting to do everything they can to hurt President Obama”.
“This is not about this particular judge”, he said. It’s the principle. Who ought to make this lifetime appointment?
On FOX News Sunday this week, columnist George Will called on Republicans to at least consider President Obama’s nominee to the Supreme Court.
It is our job as voters and citizens to fight for what the American People deserve – and I plan on doing just that.
Democrats say they believe the number of Republicans wanting the confirmation process to proceed will grow, a prospect that GOP leaders have rejected. That’s what you have to do.
Biden responded after the video went public noting that he “presided over the consideration of Justice Kennedy, Reagan nominee, who was confirmed in a Presidential year”.
Reid spokesman Adam Jentleson said comparing Democratic opposition to Republican nominees with the current Republican tactics amounted to a false equivalence.
“And their excuses are lame”, Reid told Chuck Todd. They’re going to end up losing seats. I do, however, applaud his nomination of Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court.
“Do Republicans really think Donald Trump will make a good Supreme Court choice?”
Then he noted: “And yet, 11 years later, you wrote this: ‘The Senate’s constitutional duty to give a fair and timely hearing and a floor vote to the president’s Supreme Court nominee has remained inviolable”.
Advertisement
Republican Leader in the U.S. Senate Mitch McConnell listens to President Barack Obama’s State of the Union Address in the House Chamber at the U.S. Capitol before a joint session of Congress on Tuesday, January 24, 2012.
