Brooks: In ‘Ideal World,’ Presidents Should Be Able to Nominate Justices Whenever, But GOP ‘Set a Standard’

On Friday’s “PBS NewsHour,” New York Times columnist David Brooks stated that, ideally, presidents should be able to nominate justices to the Supreme Court “until Inauguration Day.” And “in an ideal world, Trump is right. You should be able to nominate somebody.” He added that the problem is that Republicans created a standard with Judge Merrick Garland’s Supreme Court nomination, and “to then shred the standard so quickly shows a complete sign of opportunism, a complete sign that we’re not a nation of laws and precedents, that we’re just a ruthless power grab.”

Brooks said, “Well, in a platonic, ideal world, I think presidents should be able to nominate justices until Inauguration Day. You’re elected to a four-year term, not a three-and-a-half-year term. So, I think, in an ideal world, Trump is right. You should be able to nominate somebody. The problem is with Merrick Garland. Once the Republicans set a standard, to then shred the standard so quickly shows a complete sign of opportunism, a complete sign that we’re not a nation of laws and precedents, that we’re just a ruthless power grab. And so, in this case, I think it’s an error.”

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