February 23, 2016 01:40 PM UTC

How Long Can GOP SCOTUS Obstruction Last?

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• by: Colorado Pols

As the Washington Post reports, the all-important Senate Judiciary Committee is locking down against holding any hearings on a possible replacement for recently deceased Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia:

Republican members of the Senate Judiciary Committee are determined not to hold hearings on President Obama’s nominee to the Supreme Court, making it clear on Tuesday that they back the strategy being pushed by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.).

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said it is the “consensus view” of the panel not to hold hearings.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is drawing a similarly hard line, CNN reports:

In a sharply worded statement on the Senate floor, McConnell bluntly warned the White House that the GOP-controlled Senate would not act on anyone he chooses to sit on the high court.

“Presidents have a right to nominate just as the Senate has its constitutional right to provide or withhold consent,” McConnell said. “In this case, the Senate will withhold it.”

The announcement prompted sharp criticism from Democrats, who contended that the GOP-led Senate was failing to do its job and would be risking its tenuous hold on the majority in the fall elections.

But some Republican Senators, including one up for re-election this year, are trying to put daylight between themselves and the intransigence of their Senate leadership:

In an op ed for the Chicago Sun-Times, Kirk wrote, “I recognize the right of the president, be it Republican or Democrat, to place before the Senate a nominee for the Supreme Court and I fully expect and look forward to President Barack Obama advancing a nominee for the Senate to consider.”

…Kirk writes in his editorial, “I also recognize my duty as a senator to either vote in support or opposition following a fair and thorough hearing along with a complete and transparent release of all requested information.”

Sen. Mark Kirk’s comments have been echoed by at least one other Republican Senator, Susan Collins of Maine. Last week in the immediate aftermath of Scalia’s death, we and others in Colorado took note of some “wiggle room” in the first statement from Sen. Cory Gardner–who had at least initially allowed for the possibility that President Obama might be able to come up with a nominee who could win a Senate majority. After we sniffed around some confusing news reports on the subject, Gardner’s spokesman rushed to assure us that Gardner’s position had not “evolved.”

The next day, Gardner’s position indeed “evolved”–to eliminate any possibility that an acceptable nominee might be nominated by President Obama. We’ll take some credit for helping suss out Gardner’s self-contradicting statement, but it’s clear in retrospect that a lot of Republicans were caught off-message by Scalia’s demise. Corralling everyone back into McConnell’s obstructionist fold was publicly rather, well, messy.

So what happens next? Polling shows the question of confirming a replacement for Justice Scalia breaks largely on partisan lines–for now. The question becomes whether Democrats can use the GOP’s hardening position to win support ahead of the November elections. Make no mistake, if polls show Democrats gaining the upper hand in this debate, Republicans will be strongly motivated to make a deal regardless of their rhetoric up to that point–especially since they could wield a lot of influence over a “Democratic” SCOTUS pick if they came back to the table.

If they don’t? It’s one last show of bad faith for the voters, right before a major election.