Tim Kaine – perhaps trying to stir up interest in himself as a possible choice vice president – is injecting race into the fight over the Supreme Court vacancy, suggesting Republicans are not confirming nominee Merrick Garland because President Obama is black.
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Reed’s office says the Rhode Island Democrat plans to sit down with Garland in Reed’s office in Washington on Tuesday morning.
Obama claimed Garland, now Chief Justice of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, was confirmed “unanimously by the Senate for the current positions he holds” as evidence of his worthiness to receive a hearing from Senate Republicans.
He and other Republican leaders have said the next president – and not Obama – should replace the late Justice Antonin Scalia, who died in February.
But, Republicans said they would not consider any nominee made by Obama and won’t hold hearings, making the case the next president should make the decision.
“I think that our country is better off when the Democratic nominee for the presidency and the Republican nominee are both qualified to be president and can be effective”, Obama said.
“Precisely because this election year is so insane”, Obama said, “shows you why you shouldn’t want to politicize a Supreme Court appointment”. Usually, Supreme Court nominees refrain from public speaking after they’ve been nominated and before confirmation hearings.
“Precisely because this election year has been so insane, because we have a number of Republicans say that they’re concerned about their nominee, it shows why you can’t politicize a Supreme Court vacancy”, Obama said.
In the same interview, Obama mistakenly affirmed that from the Senate to the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, his nominee, Garland, was “confirmed unanimously”.
“They watched with sadness as some in Congress raised questions about whether he was even born in the United States”, Kaine said.
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But now, Obama said, “Republicans are looking at a Republican nominee who many of them say isn’t qualified to be president, much less appoint somebody”.
