Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles Grassley on Thursday justified their decision not to hold a vote on President Obama’s pending Supreme Court nominee by quoting Minority Leader Harry Reid, who said during the Bush administration that the Senate is under no obligation to vote on any presidential nominee.
In an op-ed to appear in Friday’s Washington Post, the two Republicans noted that Reid himself pointed out in a floor speech that the Senate didn’t have to consider any of Bush’s nominees.
“The duties of the United States Senate are set forth in the Constitution of the United States,” Reid said at the time. “Nowhere in that document does it say the Senate has a duty to give presidential nominees a vote. It says appointments shall be made with the advice and consent of the Senate. That’s very different than saying every nominee receives a vote.”
Democrats, the two lawmakers wrote, have their own history of trying to block Republican Supreme Court nominees. Democratic leaders and Obama voted to filibuster the nomination of Samuel Alito, who was ultimately confirmed.
Obama said this week he regrets trying to block Alito and believes Republicans should move forward this year with his nominee.
“That was when then-senator Obama seemed to have a very different, and very robust, appreciation for the Senate’s constitutional authority,” McConnell and Grassley wrote of Obama’s filibuster vote.
Republicans are recalling past statements from Democrats as they defend their position of waiting for the next president to nominate a judge to replace the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia. But aside from just past remarks from Democrats, McConnell and Grassley also said waiting for the next president would give voters a chance to influence who gets picked, by themselves picking the president.
“Rarely does a Supreme Court vacancy occur in the final year of a presidential term, and the Senate has not confirmed a nominee to fill a vacancy arising in such circumstances for the better part of a century,” they wrote. “We don’t think the American people should be robbed of this unique opportunity.”
McConnell and Grassley are under intense pressure from Democrats to allow hearings and votes on Obama’s nominee. Senate Democratic leaders and outside liberal groups are organizing a grassroots effort to flood the offices of senators with calls and emails urging them to consider the nominee, who has yet to be selected.
In an interview Tuesday, Grassley said he would “wait until the nomination is made,” before deciding whether to hold a hearing. But in Friday’s op-ed, he appears to argue against moving forward with a nominee this year.
“No one disputes the president’s authority to nominate a successor to Scalia, but as inconvenient as it may be for this president, Article II, Section 2, of the Constitution grants the Senate the power to provide, or as the case may be, withhold its consent,” McConnell and Grassley wrote.
