The Republican National Committee is joining forces with conservative interest groups on a concerted effort to prevent President Obama from naming a new justice to the U.S. Supreme Court to replace the late conservative Justice Antonin Scalia. Senate Republicans have vowed to not even hold hearings on whomever Obama nominates, and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and Sen. Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) met on March 2 with dozens of prominent conservative groups to agree on a strategy to sell that to the public and pressure Democrats up for election this year, The Washington Times reports.
The RNC will coordinate those efforts and contract with America Rising Squared to dig up opposition research on potential Obama nominees. On Friday, the conservative Judicial Crisis Networks, which also hired America Rising, launched a $250,000 ad campaign to tar one potential Obama pick, Judge Jane Kelly of the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. RNC Chairman Reince Priebus said that the goal of the campaign is to "make sure Democrats have to answer to the American people for why they don't want voters to have a say in this process." So far, most polls show that a majority of Americans want Obama to pick the next justice, and oppose the GOP's court-blocking maneuver.
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