Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX), the Senate majority whip, wouldn’t say Tuesday if Republicans would permanently block Hillary Clinton’s Supreme Court nominees if she were elected president, as some GOP senators have been promising on the campaign trail.
In a radio interview with KFYO in Texas, Cornyn said he didn’t want to “speculate” about what Republicans should do if Clinton is elected and in a position to appoint Supreme Court justices.
“We need to see what happens at the election and we need – we’ve already got one vacancy that we need to deal with after this election. Hopefully this will be a nomination that will be made by Mr. Trump and not Mrs. Clinton, and I think we avoid all of the concerns that have been raised by Sen. Cruz and Sen. McCain,” Cornyn said. “So I prefer not to speculate at this point on what might happen. I’m still hopeful that we’ll elect the Republican nominee on November the eight and it will all be a moot point.”
The comments from the No. 2 Republican in the Senate, who is also a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, comes after Sens. John McCain (R-AZ) signaled he’d work to block Clinton’s nominees before clarifying that he’d consider each nominee’s qualifications before deciding. Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) said “there is long historical precedent for a Supreme Court with fewer justices.” And Sen. Richard Burr (R-NC) said he would “do everything I can do to make sure four years from now, we still got an opening on the Supreme Court.”
Correction: An editing error misstated Cruz”s position on whether Supreme Court nominees should be considered throughout Clinton’s presidency.
