Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) has had a hard time determining if he will meet with President Obama's Supreme Court nominee or not. Apparently the meeting with Merrick Garland is on, but the 82-year old senator wants to minimize the importance of his agreeing to it. He needs to find a better way to do that.
"If I can meet with a dictator in Uganda, I can surely meet with a decent person in America," Grassley said Thursday.
He added that it's a "pretty hard to say no" to an hour-long meeting with Garland.
"I want to make it clear that the message we told him on the phone yesterday—I will tell him face-to-face," Grassley.
Grassley's position is different than his party leadership's stance. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell told the judge in a phone call Wednesday he would not be meeting with him.
That's a key crack in Mitch McConnell's blockade, albeit a really unfortunately worded one. McConnell has been insisting on complete obstruction—no courtesy meetings with the nominee, no hearings, and no votes. His best bet at coming out of this with a win in November was a united front and he's losing that. Republicans started scattering at the announcement it would be moderate Garland, some saying they'd be happy to meet with him, some even floating the idea of having the vote for him in the lame duck—a trial balloon quickly deflated by McConnell's deputy, John Cornyn (R-TX).
This confusion among the Republicans really reflects just how outlandish McConnell's scheme is. They all know that this is not how they're supposed to be operating and they are not comfortable with it. At all. They also know how hard it is going to be to justify refusing to do their jobs when they're back home for the next two weeks on Easter recess. Which is probably why Grassley relented. Things haven't been going so well for him with local media. Maybe he thinks this will make them go a little easier on him. He shouldn't bet on it.
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