Supreme Court Nomination Set to Break Record for Inaction
Merrick Garland was nominated in March, but he hasn't gotten a vote
Merrick Garland ‘s nomination to the Supreme Court is set to become the longest ever without action by the Senate.
On Wednesday, it will be 126 days since President Barack Obama selected the D.C. appeals court jurist to succeed Antonin Scalia, who died in February.
His nomination has been an election-year lightning rod with Republicans refusing to give him a hearing, much less a vote.
One group with a lot at stake in the composition of the court, NARAL Pro-Choice America , will mark the milestone with “awards” for Republican senators blocking the Garland vote.
It will hand out trophies on Tuesday at the state offices of the following Republican senators: Roy Blunt in Missouri, Patrick J. Toomey in Pennsylvania and Charles E. Grassley, the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, in Iowa.
Grassley, they said, would get a really big one.
Until now, the longest it took for a Supreme Court nominee to be confirmed was 125 days. That was in 1916 for Justice Louis Brandeis.
While Garland is setting a record for a nominee, the opening to replace Scalia is not the longest Supreme Court vacancy. That one was nearly a year for Abe Fortas in 1969 .
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