Biden says he never opposed confirming nominees pre-election

Concerning the idea of entertaining a potential Supreme Court nominee before the November presidential election is decided, Allahpundit at Hot Air has summarized the left’s current utterly hypocritical situation in a succinct way we’ll never see in the establishment press: “The current president, current vice president, current Senate minority leader, and incoming Senate minority leader have all gone on record in the past in favor of obstructing a Supreme Court nominee”. Joe Biden saying President George H.W. Bush shouldn’t nominate a new justice until after the election was held.

Biden defended himself in a written statement, saying that in his 1992 speech he said the Senate and White House should cooperate “to ensure the court functions as the founding fathers intended”. “Otherwise, it seems to me, Mr. President, we will be in deep trouble as an institution”.

“Once the political season is underway and it is, action on a Supreme Court nomination must be put off until after the election campaign is over”, Biden said at the time on the Senate floor, according to a C-SPAN recording of his remarks.

More precisely, they embraced a fourth-term Sen.

In fact, he said that if President Bush put forward a nominee, the Judiciary Committee – his committee – should “seriously consider not scheduling confirmation hearings on the nomination until after the political campaign season is over”.

In the 10 days since Scalia’s death, politicians of both parties have been forced to square their current positions on whether or not to confirm Obama’s promised nominee with their past statements on judicial nominations.

U.S. Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, broke ranks with Republican leaders on Monday, telling CNN that President Obama’s nominee to fill a vacancy on the U.S. Supreme Court should be given a hearing. “Some critics say that one excerpt of my speech is evidence that I oppose filling a Supreme Court vacancy in an election year”, he said. And embedded in the roughly 20,000 words he delivered on the Senate floor that day were rebuttals to virtually every point Democrats has brought forth in the past week to argue to the consideration of Obama’s nominee.

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

Since Antonin Scalia’s death, there’s been a heated discussion about who should get to pick his successor on the Supreme Court.