SCOTUS nominee expected as early as this morning EDIT: looks like it's Garland

[Stranger in a strange land]

So is the fact that Garland is old part of the calculation here?  A few months from now, if Clinton is leading general election matchups by double digits and it looks like the GOP stands a good chance of losing the Senate, then having an older nominee makes at least some of the Senate Republicans more likely to buckle, since they figure that a President Hillary Clinton with a Democratic Senate would yield a Supreme Court Justice who's further to the left, and young enough to serve an additional 15 years?  So they give in and approve Garland, since the alternative is worse?

They can't do that without pissing off their base and making it look like they're caving to Obama, which is why this is so brilliant.

[Stranger in a strange land]

They need to get him through the Judiciary Committee first.



The US Senate's Judiciary Committee, which Justice Garland will need a majority of to even go before the Senate Floor:

 Republicans (11)
•Chuck Grassley, Iowa, Chair
•Orrin Hatch, Utah
•Jeff Sessions, Alabama
•Lindsey Graham, South Carolina
•John Cornyn, Texas
•Mike Lee, Utah
•Ted Cruz, Texas
•Jeff Flake, Arizona
•David Vitter, Louisiana
•David Perdue, Georgia
•Thom Tillis, North Carolina

Democrats (9)
•Patrick Leahy, Vermont, Ranking Member
•Dianne Feinstein, California
•Chuck Schumer, New York
•Dick Durbin, Illinois
•Sheldon Whitehouse, Rhode Island
•Amy Klobuchar, Minnesota
•Al Franken, Minnesota
•Chris Coons, Delaware
•Richard Blumenthal, Connecticut


So we need at least 2 of those Republicans to vote to proceed to the Senate Floor.

Grassley, Graham, Hatch, Flake, and Cornyn are the ones I would work on in that order.

Graham and Hatch are the only possible ones. Grassley might if he's he's shackled to a toxic Trump ticket and in serious danger of losing his seat, but even then, I doubt it.