Brian Sandoval Declines to Participate in Obama's Supreme Court Ploy

Mar 05, 2016, 23:19

Obama vowed on Wednesday to move ahead with a nominee and said Republicans would risk public ire if they blocked a qualified candidate for political motives, as well as diminishing the credibility of the high court.

Sen. Tom Udall, a Democrat and a former New Mexico attorney general, said he has a high opinion of Sandoval and would have seriously considered supporting his nomination. Following rumors he was on the short list of potential replacements for the late Antonin Scalia, Sandoval released a statement giving up his tenuous claim to the seat. Dean Heller, a Republican, said Nevadans should have a voice in approving a selection - which his aides said meant the next president, not Obama, should fill the vacancy.

But then Heller reversed himself and joined the group of Senators saying any nomination should wait for the next President. As the Associated Press reports, the Nevada governor officially told the White House "thanks, but no thanks" in a statement issued on Thursday. Heller's written statement concluded, "But should he decide to nominate someone to the Supreme Court, who knows, maybe it'll be a Nevadan".

A former Iowa lieutenant governor and secretary of Agriculture is weighing a run for Sen.

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He was elected that year and re-elected in 2014.

Sandoval also has an interesting long-term relationship with frenemy Harry Reid, the Democrats' leader in the Senate.

But just because the Sandoval trial balloon collapsed within 24 hours of launch doesn't mean it won't happen. "We'll miss him but we'll do our work", he said at the Newseum Institute in Washington.

Sandoval's critics at home have more often come from the right than from the left.

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In the absence of the ability to do so, the president might end up resorting to unorthodox tactics to get his nominee through - including appointing a Republican, like Nevada Gov. Brian Sandoval.

Limited to two terms, Sandoval's final term as governor expires in early 2019. Way back in 2004 when Sandoval was attorney general, Reid recommended him to the Bush administration as a Republican he would gladly back for a seat on the federal judiciary.

As I noted yesterday, selecting Sandoval would have placed Senate Republicans in a particularly interesting political position vis a vis their "No Hearings, No Votes" strategy regarding the current Supreme Court vacancy, so for that reason alone it's unfortunate that we'll miss out on that particular bit of political theater.

Chairman of the Judiciary, Chuck Grassley, stressed that the Senate would not act on any Supreme Court nominee until the next president sits in the White House on January 2017, following the presidential election on November 8. McConnell and other Republicans have argued that a nomination should be delayed until after the election year when a new president can make the appointment, promising to block Obama's nominee.

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Food and Drug Administration, however, has suggested a more detailed time frame. The ultrasounds of 12 of the infected women - 29 percent - found abnormalities.

Democrats have tried to keep a daily focus on the issue.