Blocking any of President Barack Obama's Supreme Court nominees would be "the most nakedly partisan" move Republican senators could make in history, Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid wrote in an
op-ed for The Washington Post Monday night, and such a move could haunt them.
"Our founders who envisioned a fair, bipartisan process must be rolling in their graves," the Nevada Democrat wrote. "If my Republican colleagues proceed down this reckless path, they should know that this act alone will define their time in the majority. Thinking otherwise is fantasy."
On Saturday, shortly after the announcement was made that Justice Antonin Scalia, 79, had been found dead at a Texas ranch during a hunting vacation, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) stated that Obama should not pick a replacement, saying the decision should wait for the eventual presidential race winner.
But if the nominee is blocked, Reid warned, the Republican majority would be remembered as "the most nakedly partisan, obstructionist and irresponsible majority in history. All other impressions will be instantly and irretrievably swept away.... [This] would rank among the most rash and reckless actions in the history of the Senate. And the consequences will reverberate for decades."
Further, said Reid, the decision would mean surrendering the party to hard-line GOP candidates such as Texas Sen. Ted Cruz or Donald Trump, "having resigned any claim to leadership and enlisting as foot soldiers in a radical effort to obstruct and delegitimize the president at all costs."