Sen. Toomey says he will consider Trump's high court nominee

U.S. Sen. Pat Toomey will not try to block President Donald Trump’s attempt to fill a vacancy on the U.S. Supreme Court less than 40 days before the election, he said Tuesday.

The Lehigh Valley Republican joined the successful effort to block President Barack Obama from filling a vacancy on the court eight months before the 2016 election, saying it was best to allow the American people to elect the next president first. Things are different now with the vacancy created by the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, he said.

“In 2016, the White House and the Senate, which share equally the constitutional authority for filling a Supreme Court vacancy, were controlled by different parties. When power is divided during a presidential election year, the Senate’s general practice has been to leave open a Supreme Court vacancy so that the voters may speak and possibly resolve the disagreement created by the division,” Toomey said in a statement. “The circumstances surrounding the current vacancy are, in fact, different. While there is a presidential election this year, the White House and the Senate are currently both controlled by the same party. The Senate’s historical practice has been to fill Supreme Court vacancies in these circumstances.”

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., has vowed to give Trump’s nominee a vote before the election, though 62% of respondents to a Reuters/Ipsos poll said the vacancy should be filled by whoever wins the Nov. 3 election.

Democrats pushed to fill the vacancy created by the death of Justice Antonin Scalia in February 2016, only to see the Republican-controlled Senate block consideration of nominee Judge Merrick Garland.

U.S. Sen. Bob Casey, D-Scranton, called the Republican stance “disturbing and hypocritical” given their actions in 2016.

Few were surprised that Toomey opted against standing with Republican Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowksi of Alaska. They said they favor waiting until after the election to fill the vacancy. On Tuesday afternoon, Collins went further and said that she would vote against any nominee brought to the Senate floor before the election.

Four Senate Republicans would be needed to block consideration of the nominee that Trump said he will announce by Saturday. Reaching that number took a blow Tuesday when Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, said he favors a vote on filling the vacancy this year.

Alison Dagnes, a political science professor at Shippensburg University of Pennsylvania who follows Pennsylvania politics, said Toomey is simply following the Republican party line.

“I don’t know that the circumstances are any different this year than that their guy is in the White House. I think this is really all about the current political climate. The Republican Party said instead of having a policy platform, they were going to stand with President Trump and I think this is a continuation of that,” Dagnes said.

Toomey pledged to consider the nominee’s “character, intellect, and experience … the same objective, non-partisan criteria that I have used to evaluate judicial nominees under both President Obama and President Trump.”