Close-minded

Kirk rips 'close-minded' GOP on Garland nomination

By Burgess Everett

Mark Kirk could have been in Illinois, waging what might be the most difficult reelection campaign in Congress. Instead, the Republican senator was on Capitol Hill Tuesday drawing national attention for meeting with Supreme Court nominee Merrick Garland.

Kirk became the first Republican to meet with Garland, a huddle that took place in the middle of a long congressional recess and was covered by more than 50 journalists. It featured some impromptu remarks by Kirk, who's been tight-lipped in the Capitol as he fights to save his job in November.

Sitting beside Garland in his office, Kirk lavished praise on the Illinois native as a “brilliant” legal mind who is “one of the most eminent jurists in the country.” Then he shifted to his own party’s blockade of Garland, remarking that Republican senators who won’t even meet with Garland are “too closed-minded.”

“By leading by example, I’m showing what a rational, responsible guy would do that really wants the constitutional process to go forward,” Kirk said.

Everything has to go exactly right for Kirk to beat Rep. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.), since Illinois votes reliably Democratic in presidential years. So the moderate Republican has seized on the Garland nomination to establish his independence from the Republican Party line.

“Judge Garland, he’s been duly nominated by the elected president of the United States to fill a vacancy which we know exists on the court. We need open-minded, rational, responsible people to keep an open mind to make sure the process works,” Kirk said. “When you just say you’re not going to meet them and all that, it’s too closed-minded."

In a statement, Duckworth's campaign complained that "Senator Kirk seems to expect extra credit for doing the bare minimum." But political allies of the senator said leaning into the Supreme Court debate is an effective way for Kirk to break with party leaders on a national issue.

“This is a perfect opportunity for Sen. Kirk to illustrate his independent brand,” said one national GOP strategist, adding that it could help him politically since Garland is from the Chicago area.

Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and other Senate leaders are giving Kirk plenty of space to carve out his own stance on the Supreme Court. He's receiving little pressure to toe the party line, sources said. Earlier this month Kirk demanded that Republicans “man up” and vote on the nomination. It was a stark contrast to Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wisc.), who faces a similarly perilous reelection path, but who said Tuesday in an email that he is "getting strong support" back home for backing McConnell's "no hearings, no votes" strategy.

Publicly, Kirk and McConnell have agreed to disagree.

“Mark Kirk is a great senator. He's running this year in Illinois. I'm confident he's going to get reelected,” McConnell said on ABC when asked earlier this month about Kirk’s comments. “Most of my members are very comfortable with letting the American people make this decision by electing the next president who will fill this vacancy next year.”

Back home in Illinois, Kirk’s stance has drawn mixed reviews. Democrats are urging him to oppose McConnell as the head of the Senate GOP, a nonstarter, while a prominent law professor praised Kirk in the state’s largest newspaper but pleaded with him to go further and persuade his colleagues to take up Garland.

Still, Kirk is winning allies who don’t traditionally speak well of Republicans. On Thursday, a coalition including Planned Parenthood and the Sierra Club will hold a news conference to thank the senator for his stance.

Democrats have cast Kirk’s meeting and other planned sitdowns between Garland and GOP senators — such as Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) — as a crack in McConnell’s plans. Seventeen Republicans, ranging from conservatives like Marco Rubio to the more centrist Lisa Murkowski, have signaled some willingness to sit down with Garland after McConnell set the tone for the conference by refusing a meeting with Obama’s nominee.

Those meetings are viewed by the White House and Senate Democrats as significant developments in their goal to get Garland a hearing by next month.

“Yes, it’s a crack,” said Sen. Chuck Schumer of New York in an interview this month. “They look rude. They look like smaller people if they won’t see him.”

Republicans are unconcerned. Only Sen. Jerry Moran of Kansas has joined Kirk and Collins’ calls for a hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee. During a tour of his home state this week, the panel's chairman, Chuck Grassley of Iowa, has remained adamantly behind McConnell's strategy.

Republicans inside and outside the Capitol say there’s never been an edict from McConnell or anyone else to deny Garland a meeting with senators, though Collins told a Maine radio station that McConnell is "not real happy" with her.

“I don’t think there’s been a solid Republican line on meeting with people,” said Carrie Severino, chief counsel of the Judicial Crisis Network.

Severino’s group has spent $4 million pressuring Democrats to oppose Garland and buck up Republicans who are blocking him. The group is preparing an advocacy campaign to press Moran to reverse his position in favor of hearings and a vote. So far, no such campaign is in the works targeting Kirk.