A new NBC News/Wall Street Journal Poll released Tuesday led to a slew of headlines reflecting the fact that the majority of Americans want the Senate to do its job and begin working to confirm President Obama’s Supreme Court nominee, Merrick Garland.
“Democrats are winning the Supreme Court fight over Merrick Garland. Big time,” announced the Washington Post.
By a 22-point margin (52-30) voters would like to see “the Senate vote on [Justice Scalia's] replacement” this year. When the question was first asked in February, this margin was only a single point (43-42).
Yet Republicans and conservative voters continue to isolate themselves from the rest of the electorate with their intransigence on taking any action on Garland’s nomination.
This is the conundrum for Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, and Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY). They can mollify the radical base of their party or they can do their jobs, consistent with the will of the people. Thus far their choice has been clear.
Grassley once again swore fealty to the radical right on a conference call with the anti-choice organization Susan B. Anthony List on Monday night, promising them “we aren’t going to have a hearing.”
Right now, despite the polling, Republican strategists believe their elected leaders' intransigence serves their own electoral benefit. Josh Holmes, who ran McConnell’s 2014 reelection campaign told the Wall Street Journal, “Any time you are looking at an electorate where you want to ensure the base is motivated to support a candidate, an issue like this helps.” He continued, “by almost any measure that we’ve seen thus far, the voters who fall into that swing category that determine an election just aren’t that interested in the Supreme Court fight.”
Holmes and many Republicans are being misled by the data. Voters want a functional government and elect senators to do a job. They are rightfully repulsed when it isn’t done.
Voters aren’t thinking about the confirmation of Merrick Garland as a fight between liberal and conservative policy outcomes. Instead it is about which party is causing dysfunction in Washington. Republicans are proudly raising their hands to take credit for the chaos, fulfilling the wishes of their base.
However, with polling data trending against them, McConnell and Grassley are putting several of their colleagues in close races in untenable positions. As a greater majority of voters push for action on the nomination, senators in close races are bound to begin to question their leadership’s obstructionist strategy.
