Republic Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said Tuesday that the U.S. Senate will not consider, confirm, hold a hearing for, or even meet with any Supreme Court nominee that President Obama puts forth. This adds to the list of obstructive actions of the Republican-lead Senate during Obama’s last year in office.
“Presidents have a right to nominate, just as the Senate has its constitutional right to provide or withhold consent. In this case, the Senate will withhold it,” McConnell said, according to Reuters. “The Senate will appropriately revisit the matter after the American people finish making in November the decision they’ve already started making today.”
These comments answered any question to whether to Senate was willing to allow Obama to fill the Supreme Court vacancy. Judge Antonin Scalia, one of the most conservative judges in the Court, died unexpectedly on Feb. 13 at the age of 79.
The Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee also issued a written vow to not hold a hearing for any of Obama’s SCOTUS nominees. McConnell, along with several other Republican senators, urged the President not to even submit a name for nomination. “I don’t see the point of going through the motions if we know that the outcome is going to be,” said Texas Senator John Cornyn told the The New York Times.
Those who are fighting Obama’s right to nominate anyone have cited Joe Biden as a supporter of their position. In a 1992 speech while in Senate, Biden argued that presidents should not nominate Supreme Court Justices during an election year. Vice President Biden has defended his claim since, saying it was hypothetical and completely taken out of context.
Filling Justice Scalia’s seat could have been a chance to change the balance of the Supreme Court. The SCOTUS only has eight judges at the moment, which could lead to four vs. four ties on issues that reach the court.
Many Democrats and scholars see the Republican Senators actions as obstructionist. Julian E. Zelizer, a professor of history and public affairs at Princeton University, told The New York Times, “What is remarkable is the opposition is not to a particular candidate or even to the notion Obama will nominate someone too extreme, but that he should not have any right to have a nomination considered.”
According to the The Washington Times, Sen. Chris Coons, a Democrat, suggested that Obama nominate “the most qualified, the most confirmable, the most centrist candidate possible” in order to increase the chances that a nominee is confirmed by both Democrats and moderate Republicans.
However, the Republicans in Congress seem opposed to anything Obama is trying to do: As The New York Times points out, they have refused to consider the President’s plans to shut down the prison in Guantanamo Bay, authorize new military force against ISIS, and even to hold a hearing on his budget for 2016. Will President Obama be able to get anything to pass through Congress during his last year in office?