In a Washington Post op-ed published on Monday night, Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) blasted Republicans who have called for the Senate to block President Obama’s nominee to replace Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, who passed away over the weekend.
Reid said that Senate Republicans’ “campaign of partisan sabotage” could have “potentially momentous consequences.”
“Republicans should not insult the American people’s intelligence by pretending there is historical precedent for what they are about to do. There is not,” he wrote.
The minority leader warned that blocking Obama’s nominee could set a dangerous precedent.
“Not only is that principle absurd on its face, but if we set that precedent now, there is nothing to stop future Senates from sliding further down that slippery slope,” he wrote. “It is a small and easily envisioned step to go from ‘no Supreme Court confirmations in this specific election year’ to ‘no confirmations in any election year.’ Our founders who envisioned a fair, bipartisan process must be rolling in their graves.”
“If we enshrine this precedent and declare a functioning Supreme Court optional, subordinate to the whim of the Senate majority, it is easy to envision a future where the Supreme Court is routinely crippled,” Reid continued.
Reid also said that by blocking an Obama nominee, Republicans would be “unconditionally surrendering their party to hard-line presidential candidates Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) and Donald Trump.”
“Behind closed doors, many of my colleagues complain about the direction their party has taken in recent years,” he wrote. “But if they cross this Rubicon, they will be as culpable as Sen. Cruz or Trump themselves, having resigned any claim to leadership and enlisting as foot soldiers in a radical effort to obstruct and delegitimize the president at all costs.”
