Sen. Lindsey Graham admitted that Senate Republicans are obstructing Obama’s Supreme Court nominee because they are still upset that Democrats changed the filibuster rules in 2013.
Senator Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican who sits on the Judiciary Committee and has backed Democratic Supreme Court picks in the past, said the court fight was payback for the 2013 decision by Senate Democrats to unilaterally change Senate rules to make it easier to break Republican filibusters against executive branch nominations. They then pushed more Obama administration nominees onto the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, perhaps the most important court below the Supreme Court.
“This is the consequence of an abuse of power,” Mr. Graham said. “Don’t ask for fairness if you are not going to give it.”
After Senate Republicans had driven obstruction to a historically high level that had ground the Senate to a halt, then Senate Majority Leader Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV) and Senate Democrats used the “nuclear option” to change the filibuster rules on presidential nominations, but the change did not include legislation or Supreme Court nominations.
There is probably some truth to what Sen. Graham said. Senate Republicans do see this as payback for filibuster rules change, but the overwhelming reason for the obstruction is that the Republicans don’t want to let President Obama appoint another Supreme Court justice to the bench. At least, the Republicans are coming closer to admitting that what they are doing has nothing to do with anyone that President Obama might nominate.
The obstruction of Obama’s SCOTUS nominee is all about politics. Polling has revealed that the Republican strategy is on pace to cost them, at least, four Senate seats in November, but the with prospects for Republican victory looking more glum by the day, the GOP is throwing up a political Hail Mary centered around a hope of capturing the White House and keeping the Supreme Court’s conservative majority.
Presidential election voters have a history of not rewarding cynical and negative politics. By obstructing Obama’s SCOTUS nominee Republicans are pulling a cynical stunt that is almost certain to backfire on them in November.
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