Reuters poll: Most Americans say winner of election should appoint new Supreme Court justice

WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW:

• A large majority (62 percent) of Americans said that the vacancy left by the late Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg should be filled by the winning presidential candidate after the election, according to a poll by Reuters-Ipsos.
• President Donald Trump said that he will nominate a new Supreme Court justice which Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell vowed to secure a vote.
• Democrat lawmakers have blasted McConnell and the GOP’s support of Trump’s intent to make a new appointee prior the Election Day, calling them ‘hypocrites.’

Based on a new poll by Reuters-Ipsos released on Sunday, a large majority of Americans said that the winning presidential candidate on November 3rd Election Day should be the one to select a new Supreme Court Justice to fill out the post left by associate justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who passed away last Friday. 

The survey findings showed that 62 percent of Americans said that whoever wins the presidency this November ━ either President Donald Trump or former vice president Joe Biden ━ should be the one to pick a new justice.

Meanwhile, 23 percent of Americans did not agree that the vacancy should be filled by the presidential-elect candidate, while the rest abstained, the poll said.

In terms of political affiliation, based on the poll, 80 percent of Democrats said that appointment should come after the election, and about 50 percent of Republicans agreed.

Recently., however, Trump said that he will nominate a successor with Senate Majority leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) pledging to hold a vote on the president’s chosen successor.

Democratic lawmakers condemned McConnell and GOP’s move to get a quick vote just weeks before the election. They called the Republican legislators ‘hypocrites,’ since in 2016, McConnell and others interrupted President Barack Obama’s Supreme Court nominee when Justice Antonin Scalia died nine months before Election Day.

The GOP refuted the hypocrisy allegations, arguing that there is a historic basis for a president to make a nominee, and for the Senate majority of the same political affiliation to ratify the appointee.

However, over the weekend, both GOP Senators Susan Collins (R-Maine.) and Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) voiced their opposition to holding a vote before November 3rd.

The Republicans cannot afford to have more than three nominee rejections especially if all 47 Democrat caucus members of the Senate would deny Trump’s appointee.

The poll’s method was via an online survey, with 1,006 adults which include 463 Democrats and 374 GOPs. According to Reuters, the survey has a confidence interval of +/- 4 percentage points.

According to the Newswire, the nationwide poll commenced on September 19 and 20, after the judiciary announced Ginsburg’s passing.

Source: The Hill