Schumer Asks Trump To Nominate Merrick Garland To Supreme Court

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NEW YORK (JTA) — Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer urged President Donald Trump to nominate Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court, according to a report in The Washington Post.
Schumer, a Jewish Democrat from New York, made the request in a phone call earlier this week, The Post reported.
Garland, who also is Jewish, was President Barack Obama’s nominee in 2016 following the death of Justice Antonin Scalia. Senate Republicans, however, would not consider the nomination in March, saying it had to wait until after the presidential election in November.
Trump chose Neal Gorsuch to fill Scalia’s position, and Gorsuch was confirmed. With Justice Anthony Kennedy announcing last month that he is retiring, Trump gets to pick another justice to serve on the court.
Schumer knows getting Trump to even consider putting Garland on the court is highly unlikely. The conversation “seemed more like a check the box call than meaningful conversation” because Trump already has a shortlist of conservative nominees, a source told The Hill.
Trump said he is announcing his nomination on Monday. Many Jewish groups, such as the National Council of Jewish Women, along with Democrats are concerned that his pick will shift the court deeply to the right and potentially undo recent progressive victories on abortion rights and same sex marriage.
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