Pretty much everyone flip-flops on election year SCOTUS nominations


Vice President Joe Biden on Monday was added to the tally of politicians (like President Obama) who have contradicted themselves on election-year nominations to fill Supreme Court vacancies. "Senate consideration of a nominee under these circumstances is not fair to the president, the nominee, or to the Senate itself," he said in the run-up to the 1992 election.
Biden finds himself in ample company. The Washington Post's Fact Checker blog counts "a bushel of flip-flops on approving judicial nominees" from both sides of the aisle. For example, Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) argued in April 2008, "There is no reason for stopping the confirmation of judicial nominees in the second half of a year in which there is a presidential election." But this year, he discovered that there is a tradition, after all, and it's "not to confirm someone in the last year."
Also making the list are Sens. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), and Harry Reid (D-Nev.). It's almost like this is more about partisanship than governance?
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Bonnie Kristian was a deputy editor and acting editor-in-chief of TheWeek.com. She is a columnist at Christianity Today and author of Untrustworthy: The Knowledge Crisis Breaking Our Brains, Polluting Our Politics, and Corrupting Christian Community (forthcoming 2022) and A Flexible Faith: Rethinking What It Means to Follow Jesus Today (2018). Her writing has also appeared at Time Magazine, CNN, USA Today, Newsweek, the Los Angeles Times, and The American Conservative, among other outlets.
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