Posted on 07/30/2012 4:07:01 PM PDT by jazusamo
Senate Republicans blocked a vote on the nomination of Robert Bacharach to be a U.S. circuit judge for the Tenth Circuit court in Oklahoma on Monday because they said it violated an election-year practice.
The 56-34-3 vote came despite previously-stated support of Bacharach from the Oklahoma Republican Sens. Tom Coburn and James Inhofe. They chose not to vote against what their party leadership urged, instead they voted present. Sixty votes were needed to clear the proceedural hurdle.
“I cannot vote against this guy, but I can vote present,” Inhofe said before the vote.
Republicans said ahead of time that they’d block the nomination because of the Thurmond-Leahy Rule — a past Senate practice not to approve judicial nominations so close to a presidential election since a possible new president would want to make their own appointments.
“Now that there is a Democrat in the White House, they refuse to follow past practice on postponing the consideration of circuit court nominations this late in an election year so the American people can decide who they want making these important appointments,” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said on the floor. “They want to violate the custom in presidential election years that the [Congressional Research Service (CRS)] says they’ve been the biggest proponents of. The CRS does not say that the biggest proponent of the Leahy-Thurmond Rule is me … Rather, the CRS says that the most frequent proponent of the Rule, ‘is the current Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee.’”
White House Counsel Kathy Ruemmler criticized Republicans for blocking the nomination.
"Judge Bacharach’s qualifications are beyond dispute: he served as a federal judge for more than a dozen years, he was unanimously deemed 'well qualified' by the American Bar Association, and he enjoys strongly bipartisan support, including the backing of both of his Republican home-state Senators and was easily reported by the Senate Judiciary Committee. The American people deserve better than this unprecedented partisan obstruction of the President’s efforts to ensure a fair and functioning judiciary," she said in a statement.
Republican Sens. Scott Brown (Mass.), Susan Collins (Maine) and Olympia Snowe (Maine) voted for the motion to proceed on the nomination. Maine has a pending judicial nomination that the Senators want to see a vote on before the year ends.
Earlier in the day, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said the Republican obstructionist tactics wouldn’t surprise him since they’ve blocked several other motions to proceed to judicial nominations this year.
Reid said, “blatant partisanship” during a presidential election year “would be to blame” if the motion to end debate on the nomination wasn’t passed.
"Is it something about him? No, it's all about politics," Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) said. "If the Republicans sustain this filibuster and stop this good man… it will be the first time in the history of the United States Senate that an appeals Court nominate with bipartisan committee support has ever — ever — been filibustered on the floor of the Senate."
Senate Judiciary Committee ranking member Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) said Democrats used the Thurmond-Leahy Rule in previous years when there was a Republican president making the appointments.
“Now that our side seeks to invoke the rule, all we hear are complaints,” Grassley said. “If ever there was an example of crocodile tears, this is it … the suggestion that we today are operating any differently than Democrats did in 2004 and 2008 is absurd."
Reid said Bacharach would likely be the last vote on a circuit court nomination this year.
I’m happy that the Senate (R)s reached deep inside their collective drawers and finally found one nut they could all hold on to.
If only they could keep a grip on this nut — maybe even keep groping until they find ten or twelve more to go with it — maybe we could get somewhere with this lame bunch of losers.
LLS
http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2012/07/republicans-endorse-democrats-in-senate-races/
By John Parkinson
@jparkABC
Follow on Twitter
Jul 24, 2012 5:36pmRepublicans Endorse Democrats in Senate
With majority control of the Senate within reach for Republicans this November, one might presume that conservative party elders are doing everything within their power to elect GOP senators this fall. You’d be wrong.
Over the past two days, two veteran GOP lawmakers have gone out of their way to throw their support behind Democrats hoping to win a six-year term in the upper chamber.
Rep. Don Young, Alaska’s at-large representative who has served 20 terms in the House, taped a campaign video with Rep. Mazie Hirono, a three-term Democrat running for Hawaii’s open seat in the Senate.
Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., is also under fire for donating $250 to the reelection campaign of Sen. Joe Manchin, a conservative Democrat from West Virginia.
“He votes thinking about the long-term interests of the country,” Coburn told The Hill newspaper. “We don’t agree on everything but he’s a good guy.”
Manchin, who won a special election in 2010 to replace the late Sen. Robert Byrd, is gearing up for a rematch against businessman John Raese.
This ALMOST looks like a spine on behalf of the Senate Republicans.
...something must be in the water.
Agree 100% about Tom Coburn. Coburn with his single vote,gave Obama the stalinist nightmare: ‘Food Safety and Modernization Act’. That Act,allows Obama to control the food supply by overregulation.It even gives Obama control over home gardens. It’s aim is to use denial of food as a weapon against non-compliant American citizens. Classic leninism! Coburn is nothing less than a traitorous leftie!
The first time, eh? I must be hallucinating to remember the Democrats doing this multiple times during the Bush years and all of that drama on the Senate floor.
Thank you!
LLS
LLS
Obama will wait until enough Republicans are in the Senate bathroom, and declare a recess appointment.
Heritage Action sent out a memo:
“Although President Obama has made many objectionable judicial nominations, Mr. Bacharach’s qualifications or views are not the principal reason to oppose this vote.
“Instead, the Senate leadership knows that a vote on his nomination at this time is a violation of the traditions of the Senate, and is simply taunting Republican senators to test their resolve.
“What has come to be known as the Thurmond/Leahy Rule provides that the confirmation of life-time judges (especially Court of Appeals judges) should not proceed in the months immediately preceding a presidential election.
“The trigger date has varied over the years, but Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) was being conservative when he announced on June 13 of this year that the rule was then in effect.
“The rule both preserves an incoming president’s right to present nominees for open positions, and ensures a lame-duck president cannot – with the help of a lame-duck Senate – load up the federal courts with cronies and ideologues.
“Although the practice originated with late Senator Strom Thurmond (R-SC), Democrats have a history of invoking the rule.
“In March of 2008, Senate Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-VT) announced that “the ‘Thurmond Rule’ is a rule that we still follow, and it will take effect very soon here.”
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) echoed that sentiment by saying, “there is a Thurmond doctrine that says: After June, we will have to take a real close look at judges in a Presidential election year. June is fast approaching, I believe that is the time set forth in the Thurmond doctrine.”
“It is now the end of July, meaning that, according to the Senate Majority Leader, the Thurmond/Leahy doctrine is in effect. This is a clear test of minority rights in the Senate (rights which the majority demanded when they were in the minority), and that no senator should easily forfeit.”
It's clear the Rats have no intention of abiding by any Senate rule that doesn't favor them when they're in the majority.
It's good to see the Republicans stand up to their whining.
Good going Senators/ It’s about time.
“GOP blocks judicial nomination, says it’s too close to presidential election”
Recess appointment....
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