Mark down another bad week for President Obama’s multi-million dollar campaign to get a hearing and vote for his Supreme Court nominee, Merrick Garland
April 28, 2016
Ripped From The Headlines, Vol. 3: Democrats’ SCOTUS Effort “Fizzles,” Garland Confused With Robert Durst
Mark down another bad week for President Obama’s multi-million dollar campaign to get a hearing and vote for his Supreme Court nominee, Merrick Garland. This comes on the heels of several bad weeks of news on the White House’s SCOTUS effort.
Today, Bloomberg published a report – entitled “Obama’s Push for Court Pick Fizzles as Republicans Stand Firm” – showing that Democrats’ TV ad spending in support of Garland has “plummeted” in the face of Republicans’ unified position:
“A media blitz by the White House and its allies has failed to crack Republican opposition to President Barack Obama’s Supreme Court nominee, and it is all but certain the seat will remain vacant until after U.S. elections in November. Television ad spending to support the nominee, appeals court judge Merrick Garland, has plummeted in the last two weeks, an indication the dispute is losing traction with the public.”
The failure of Obama’s SCOTUS effort has become so clear that even the former top adviser to Democratic Leader Harry Reid, Jim Manley, stated that the Supreme Court fight is all but over for this election year:
“‘I don’t think anyone expects it to happen this year before the election,’ said Jim Manley, a Democratic strategist and former aide to Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada.”
Yesterday also saw two more Republican Senators meet with Merrick Garland and come away with their position unchanged. After their meeting, Senators Jim Inhofe and James Lankford (R-OK) re-affirmed their support for Leader McConnell’s Supreme Court position, as the NYT reported:
“Mr. Inhofe and Mr. Lankford made it clear that they opposed his nomination to replace Justice Antonin Scalia, who died in February. ‘The Senate’s constitutional role of “advice and consent” includes the ability to choose the right time and determine if the nominee is the right person,’ they said in a statement. ‘Well before the president nominated Judge Garland, the majority of the members of the Senate determined that a presidential election year is not the right time to start a nomination process for the Supreme Court.’”
The Democrat’s retreat makes more sense in light of a recent report by the Associated Press’ Julie Pace that the American people are indifferent to Garland:
JULIE PACE: “I sat in on some focus groups this past week with both swing voters and Republican voters, and some of the questions they were asked were about the Supreme Court nomination of Merrick Garland. And this was a real reality check for anyone in Washington who thinks that this issue is really animating voters across the country. I was so struck by how these voters seemed comply uninterested in the nomination fight. Among the swing voters, not one of them said that this was something that would really impact their vote in the fall. And even among the Republican voters who felt like this nomination should wait until the next president, almost none felt like this was an issue that was going to affect their vote either in the presidential race or in their Senate race.”
As just when you thought SCOTUS news couldn’t get any worse for the White House, yesterday NBC News confused Obama nominee Merrick Garland with the notorious alleged murderer Robert Durst. When it rains it pours!