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SCOTUS nominee Merrick Garland caught in partisan crossfire

Obama's selection to replace the late Scalia may be for naught.

US NEWS SCOTUS-GARLAND 1 SIP
President Barack Obama, left, shakes hands with Judge Merrick Garland, chief justice for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, right, after announcing him as his nominee for the Supreme Court in the Rose Garden of the White House on Wednesday, March 16, 2016.

President Obama announced Merrick Garland as his nominee Wednesday for the Supreme Court to replace the late justice Antonin Scalia.

“This is the greatest honor of my life,” a choked-up Garland said in a press conference at the White House, aired on PBS News Hour following Obama’s announcement. “For me, there could be no higher public service than serving as a member of the United States Supreme Court.”

Unfortunately for Garland, the greatest honor of his life may just be a tease.

Ironically, the public service Garland hopes to provide might be blocked by what some might call a failure to serve the public on part of the U.S. Senate. Republicans on Capitol Hill — led by Senator and majority leader Mitch McConnell — say they won’t confirm Obama’s SCOTUS appointee, a move that repeats a precedent of blocking presidential nominees when a president’s term is near completion.

“The American people elected a Republican Senate in the last election,” McConnell said in a column he wrote for USA Today. “The American people may well elect a president who decides to renominate Judge Garland.”

Political pundits have said Garland is appealing to both sides of the aisle, noting that he garnered support from Republicans when he was appointed to the D.C. Circuit under President Clinton. The Harvard grad has also been touted as one of the most qualified appointees in history.

Too bad he’s in the right place at the wrong time.

Imagine working through years of public school and college, earning your degree in international business, receiving a job offer from Google and celebrating the success with your family and friends. Then, you're told you have to wait for Larry Page to sway the peanut gallery at Apple to confirm your hiring.

The poor guy isn't even a stranger to this territory. In 1995, just before the end of Bill Clinton's first term, Garland was nominated to the D.C. Circuit on which he now serves. The Senate then gave Garland a hearing, but refused to nominate a potentially-departing president's nominee (Garland was renominated and confirmed with bi-partisan support after Clinton's re-election).

It’s easy to speculate that Obama’s nomination of Garland was strategic, as nominating a judge who appeals to both parties could make the steadfast GOP senators look bad. But the GOP’s refusal to have a hearing for the 63-year-old is only to maintain precedence and leverage in Washington, and prevents lame duck presidents from giving a lifetime appointment on their way out the door.

Whatever the motivation in Obama selecting Garland, I feel bad for a man who’s so close yet so far from what is likely a lifelong goal for most judges.

Unless Garland is lucky enough to get a second nomination from the next president, he’ll only be a forgotten soul in the bustling Washington landscape. His service on the DC Circuit will likely be far from as notable as the Supreme Court service from Antonin Scalia, and the GOP will get a moral victory at the expense of a man’s dream.


Reach the columnist at matt.layman@asu.edu or follow @Mattjlayman on Twitter.

Editor’s note: The opinions presented in this column are the author’s and do not imply any endorsement from The State Press or its editors.

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