It's Thursday, July 14, and Day 152 since Justice Antonin Scalia died and Mitch McConnell laid down his Supreme Court blockade: No meetings, no hearings, no votes on his replacement. It's also Day 115 since President Obama named Merrick Garland to be Scalia's replacement. What's the Senate doing today instead of considering the Supreme Court nominee?
Yes, another Zika fight. Because McConnell's favorite tactic is to vote over and over and over and over on the same thing that keeps failing. It rarely changes the outcome, but it does have the advantage for him of making the Senate look busy. Meanwhile, this reminder from Politico.
Supreme Court nominee Merrick Garland may be the most prominent casualty of the GOP-controlled Senate's election-year resistance on the federal judiciary—but the pace of overall judicial confirmations under Mitch McConnell is on track to become the slowest in more than 60 years.
Under the McConnell-led Senate, just 20 district and circuit court judges have been confirmed at a time when the vacancies are hampering the federal bench nationwide, according to the Congressional Research Service. During George W. Bush's final two years in the White House, Senate Democrats in the majority shepherded through 68 federal judges — a courtesy that Democrats now complain Republicans aren't affording to President Barack Obama, even though Obama has had more judges confirmed overall. […]
In 2015, the Republican Senate majority ushered through confirmations for 11 circuit and district court judges. So far in 2016, nine have been confirmed. That's 20 confirmed this Congress — the lowest number since the 82nd Congress in 1951-52, which confirmed just 18 judges, according to the Congressional Research Service. Harry S. Truman was president at the time. The CRS retains data on judicial confirmations dating to 1945.
The reason President Obama has had more judges confirmed overall than his predecessor is because there have been so many more vacancies to fill during his tenure. Right now, there are 89 vacancies in federal courts. At this point in George W. Bush's term, there were less than half as many, around 40. There might be a few pushed through under McConnell, because he has plenty of Republicans who would like to have the confirmations in their own states to tout.
But as of now, McConnell's desire to thwart Obama at every turn seems to be overcoming his desire to help his own team. Consider a nomination in Utah, where "the senior […] senator said he is bending McConnell's ear, trying to secure a confirmation vote for Russell. But McConnell has been noncommittal to Hatch, simply responding: 'We'll see,' according to the senator's retelling."
Helluva way to run a country.
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