With the ascension of candidate Trump to the throne of presumptive nominee, certain Republican conservative elements remain unreconstructed in their feelings towards the real-estate developer cum Presidential wannabe. Leon Wolf on RedState.com makes a tactical recommendation:
Republicans must know that there is absolutely no chance that we will win the White House in 2016 now. They must also know that we are likely to lose the Senate as well. So the choices, essentially, are to confirm Garland and have another bite at the apple in a decade, or watch as President Clinton nominates someone who is radically more leftist and 10-15 years younger, and we are in no position to stop it.
Steve Benen @ MaddowBlog remarks on this change of heart:
Or put another way, just how sure are Senate Republicans that Trump is going to win in November? If the answer is “not very,” Merrick Garland is going to start looking far more appealing to GOP senators.
Of course, Republicans have been loath to even pay Garland the courtesy of a confirmation hearing, fearing a right-wing backlash from their own party’s base, but that’s what makes the RedState commentaries so important. Conservative activists may now be far more tolerant of the Senate process now that they know who their party’s presidential nominee is going to be.
HuffPo reports Senator McConnell is standing firm:
But the calculus hasn’t changed for McConnell, who has kept his conference in line.
“While I’m glad to see Democrats concede that there won’t be a Democrat in the White House next year, Republicans continue to believe that the American people should have a voice in this decision and the next president should make the nomination,” said Don Stewart, a spokesman for McConnell.
“Despite the White House coordinating with liberal groups and millions of dollars in special-interest ads, no Republican has moved from their principled position,” he added.
Indeed, a spokeswoman for New Hampshire Sen. Kelly Ayotte, a vulnerable moderate Republican up for re-election in November, on Wednesday confirmed the senator “plans to support” Trump in the general election.
It occurs to me that President Obama could, at this time, withdraw the nomination and nominate someone younger and more liberal. This would put the GOP in a real bind. However, insofar as I can read anyone’s character, would not be in character with the President. Using anyone, much less a respected jurist, as a mere chess-piece doesn’t seem to be part of the President’s modus operandi. This would also undercut the strategy mentioned by Steve Benen and explained by Politico’s Edward-Isaac Dovere:
They’re calling it the 9-9-9 campaign: nine states, over nine days, to push for a court with nine justices. (No apologies to Herman Cain, who coined the term for his 2012 tax plan.)
More and more, though, they’re going to be talking about Donald Trump, tying in Republicans’ discomfort with the largely unpopular likely Republican nominee to say that refusing President Barack Obama’s nominee amounts to enabling a would-be President Trump’s.
The plans represent an unspoken acknowledgment that the Supreme Court fight is less about actually trying to get Garland on the bench before November, and more about turning the Republican resistance into a campaign issue to maximize GOP losses in the Senate, and even in the House. The recess efforts are both a shot across the bow from Democrats, and a test run for some of what they’ll be ramping up through the fall.
Pulling the nomination would seriously damage this strategy, so don’t look for a change in nominee.
