A few Democratic senators pledged Wednesday to give President Trump’s pick for the court a chance to make his case for the nomination, even though Republicans didn’t give President Obama the same deference.
Multiple Democratic senators said they’d meet with Judge Neil Gorsuch, who Trump selected to fill the open seat left by the death of Justice Antonin Scalia last year, and they expect to hold hearings on his nomination. Merrick Garland was nominated by Obama for the spot after Scalia’s death, but Senate Republican leadership never held a confirmation hearing for him, instead allowing his nomination to run out so Trump could fill the seat.
“I don’t think we ought to respond in a tit for tat way,” said Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., on Fox News Wednesday. Coons said it’s his view that Gorsuch should get the hearing that Garland never got.
Many Democrats have already pledged to work against Gorsuch’s nomination at every step using Senate procedures and other measures in order to delay his ascension to the court, though they don’t have the power to block hearings. But Sen. Joe Manchin told MSNBC that’s not a path he’ll be walking.
Manchin said it was embarrassing for the Senate when Majority Leader Mitch McConnell completely blocked Garland, and he doesn’t want Democrats to follow the same breach of decorum.
“What the Republicans did with Merrick Garland was absolutely unbelievable to me, it was a disaster,” he said. “I was embarrassed by how Mitch McConnell led the Republicans, not to be decent, not to even talk to the gentleman.”
He said he’s ready to meet with Gorsuch, no matter what national progressives do to influence his 2018 re-election. West Virginia went heavily for Trump, so Manchin said he feels no pressure from the left. “Let’s give the man a chance, talk to him,” he said. “My goodness, don’t shut him down before he gets started.”
Manchin, however, is perceived as a moderate Democrat who may benefit from keeping an open mind on Trump’s nomination, given that he’s up for re-election in a state that Trump won.
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., said on CNN that he doesn’t want Gorsuch to be confirmed because he’s worried about conservatives controlling the Supreme Court. However, he said the hearing process is necessary in order to see what kind of justice Gorsuch would be and senators should decide whether to vote for him based on his record, not politics.
“We’ve got hearings and a lot of time ahead to look at his record more closely,” he said.
Whitehouse added that his likely opposition to Gorsuch would be based on Republican control of the court, not his record.
“The point now is not so much that this guy is or isn’t qualified,” he said. “The point now is we’ve got to protect the court from becoming the political delivery system that the five Republicans have made it. That is a novelty in the Supreme Court’s history.”
