US Supreme Court justices pay respects to Scalia

The Dems have been keeping close watch on responses to the sudden death of Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia by their Republican rivals and have been sending out news releases detailing the play-by-play of some recent Republican-on-Republican critiques. It’s not like Scalia died a day before or after the new President of the United States was elected.

“I have served in the Senate for more than four decades, and on the Judiciary Committee for 36 years”, Leahy said this week.

Obama will spend “a good part of the weekend” reviewing files on potential candidates prepared by the White House Counsel’s office, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said. That argument being made is silly baloney, and hearing that the Republican controlled Senate is expected to do everything in their power to halt the appointment just shows how childish both political titans are.

The White House spokesman urged Republican senators to avoid turning a constitutional matter into a partisan fight and asked them to evaluate future nominees on their individual merits. Orrin Hatch said on Newsmax TV that while Grassley is free to hold hearings if he wants, doing so would be “foolish”. Senator Reid said he thinks Republicans will “be forced, as much as they hate to”, to vote for this “very superior” candidate. Vowing to exercise his responsibility to pick Scalia’s successor, Obama has sought to turn GOP resistance into a case study in Washington dysfunction and Senate gridlock in particular. “If an Obama nominee comes to a vote, Toomey would oppose the nominee, he said, barring an unlikely Obama decision to nominate someone in Scalia’s philosophical mold who would not change the court’s balance”.

“If you are 62 years old, no one is going to appoint you under the current rules”, said University of Chicago professor Harold Pollack. “The president is required to put up a nominee. So that’s what you do”.

Some have claimed that the Senate shouldn’t take up a nomination to the Supreme Court during a presidential election year. John Cornyn of Texas, said the GOP was facing no pressure to act and dismissed any concerns that the issue would be problematic for down-ticket races.

“I think my Republican counterpart McConnell has made a awful mistake by saying that he is going to ignore the president, ” Reid said. They are positioning it as an echo of the unpopular 2013 government shutdown over funding that caused 800,000 federal workers to be furloughed.

U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice Samuel Alito (C) arrives for the funeral of fellow Associate Justice Antonin Scalia at the the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception. We’ll hear Republicans candidates dissect what should and shouldn’t happen and the same will occur for the Democrats.

Vice President Joe Biden and his wife, Jill, will be among dignitaries attending the Mass. President Barack Obama is not attending. Democrats believe that a larger share of independent voters will start siding with the White House’s choice – putting pressure on swing-state Republicans and forcing them to revolt. The top Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, Vermont Sen.