Grassroots activists with the Progressive Change Campaign Committee and other left-leaning groups delivered a petition with half a million signatures to Sen. Mitch McConnell’s Louisville office Friday.
The activists want the Republican Majority Leader to allow hearings to move forward on President Obama’s eventual Supreme Court nominee. And while the GOP powerbroker has drawn a line in the sand against entertaining this administration future pick to replace the late Justice Antonin Scalia, PCCC organizer Keith Rouda says cracks are developing in the party's defenses.
"Several of Mitch McConnell's Senate Republican colleagues have changed their positions in the last day largely due to home state pressure," he tells WUKY.
Rouda says today’s petition is only the first part of a nationwide effort to convince Republican lawmakers to back off their early declarations and allow the confirmation process to proceed apace.
"The Senate has a constitutional responsibility. The president has a constitutional responsibility," Rouda says. "The process that the Constitution lays out needs to rise above the partisan issues, partisan concerns, and the politics of the situation."
McConnell has argued delaying the nomination will give voters in the upcoming presidential election a greater say in who fills the open seat on the bench. The conservative Judicial Crisis Network is also taking to the airwaves to defend McConnell.