Ex-presidents of Bar urge Garland vote
President Barack Obama’s push to get Merrick Garland confirmed to the Supreme Court has won a boost from 15 former presidents of the American Bar Association, who called on Senate leaders in a letter to take action on Garland’s nomination.
Their call came as Garland began a new round of private meetings with key Republican senators Tuesday, starting with breakfast with the man who controls whether he will get a confirmation hearing, Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles Grassley, R-Iowa.
Garland made no comment afterward. Grassley’s office issued a statement.
“As he indicated last week, Sen. Grassley explained why the Senate won’t be moving forward during this hyper-partisan election year” and “thanked Judge Garland for his service,” the statement read.
As the gatekeeper to further Senate action on Garland’s nomination, Grassley has acted in lockstep with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., who has vowed to leave the vacancy created by Justice Antonin Scalia’s February death to be filled by the next president.
That decision, the former Bar Association presidents wrote in their letter, “injects a degree of politics into the judicial branch that materially hampers the effective operation of our nation’s highest court and the lower courts over which it presides.” The signers represent 15 of the past 24 presidents of the ABA.