Sen. Joe Manchin believes there are still enough open-minded Democrats in the Senate who can be won over by President Trump’s Supreme Court nominee and help give Republicans the 60 votes they need to advance the nomination.
Trump on Tuesday nominated Judge Neil Gorsuch, which immediately started the process of finding the eight Democratic votes that will be needed to get him confirmed. Democrats are expected to require the Senate to vote to end debate on the nominee, which will take 60 votes, and with just 52 Republicans in the Senate, eight Democrats have to be found who are willing to help the GOP clear that hurdle.
So far, Manchin, D-W.Va., is the only Democrat clearly signaling he will help Republicans get to 60. But he believes others can be found.
In an interview with the Washington Examiner Wednesday, Manchin said he thinks there are “eight, 10, 12, 15 moderate, responsible [Democrats] in the middle basically” who are “not going to be pushed to one side or the other.”
“It just depends on how well he does his interviews,” Manchin said of Gorsuch’s customary sit-down time with senators.
Last year, Republicans refused to consider President Obama’s pick to fill up the Supreme Court, Merrick Garland. But while Manchin understands the desire to exact revenge and block Trump’s pick, he said, “that’s not me.”
“I hope that we’re bigger and better than that,” he said.
If 60 senators are there to end debate on Gorsuch, his confirmation will be a lock, since then it will only take 51 votes to clear him. But getting 60 in the procedural vote will likely require Gorsuch and Republicans to target a small group of Democratic senators who are seen as more flexible on the nomination given their political circumstances.
Democrats under the most pressure to comply are the 10 most vulnerable senators up for re-election in 2018 in states Trump won. One of those is Manchin himself, but another, Ohio Sen. Sherrod Brown, is a reliable liberal and is a strong public “no” on Gorsuch.
Of the remaining eight, four are from red states that voted overwhelmingly for Trump: Sens. Joe Donnelly of Indiana, Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota, Claire McCaskill of Missouri and Jon Tester of Montana.
The other four are from states that swung for Trump in November but are historically more divided. Of those four, two are usually reliable liberal Democrats, Sen. Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin and Debbie Stabenow of Michigan, while the other two are more independent: Sen. Bill Nelson of Florida and Bob Casey of Pennsylvania.
Heitkamp said “absolutely” when asked by Politico if the Senate should avoid a filibuster on Gorsuch, but it’s not clear if she’s as committed as Manchin is to helping Republicans get to 60 votes. She issued a statement on Gorsuch that said she still thought it was unfair the how Republicans treated Garland last year, but she was vague on whether that would affect her decision on Gorsuch.
“It’s up to the Senate to fully consider any nominees to the Supreme Court and learn about them through meetings and congressional hearings,” she said.
Tester, one of the most vulnerable senators in 2018, was more circumspect, telling reporters Wednesday that he didn’t know much about Gorsuch yet and would need to talk to him about his views and any rulings pertaining to the rights of women and minorities.
Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., echoed the statements, saying Wednesday he still needed time to review Gorsuch’s record after stating that he wanted a “full examination” of his record before making a decision. Donnelly, McCaskill and Casey made similar comments that talked about the need to review his record, but didn’t clarify whether they would look to stop the nominee.
Meanwhile, Baldwin and Stabenow have broadcast more negative views in their statements. Baldwin, for example, said she has “a number of concerns about [Gorsuch’s] deeply troubling record, particularly his rulings against disabled students, against workers, and against women’s reproductive healthcare.”
Democrats will be under enormous pressure from their base to vote against Gorsuch as a rebuke to Trump and his efforts to quickly overturn many of Obama’s initiatives. Some Democratic senators have said Trump’s executive action temporarily halting immigration and most travel from seven countries has hardened their stance on Gorsuch.
If enough Democrats don’t join with the GOP to break a filibuster, the spotlight will quickly switch to Republicans and whether they use their majority power to go “nuclear” and permanently blow up the rule requiring a 60-vote procedural threshold for Supreme Court nominations.
Trump is pressuring Republicans to go nuclear, but institutionalists like Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., and several others have serious reservations, knowing that a permanent change could come back to haunt them when Democrats regain control of the chamber with a Democratic president.
