Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell speaks to the media about the recent vacancy at the U.S. Supreme Court on Feb. 23, 2016, in Washington. | Getty McConnell: No hearings or meetings with Supreme Court nominee Senior Republicans said they are committed to cutting off any White House effort to fill out the bench.

Senate Republicans will deny hearings to a Supreme Court nominee from President Barack Obama and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said he's not inclined to even meet with whomever the president picks for the job.

The party quickly dug in behind McConnell's strategy in a series of decisive gatherings. The Senate Judiciary Committee membership met with McConnell privately on Tuesday, then penned a letter signed by all 11 committee Republicans vowing not to hold hearings for a nominee. Then the entire GOP Conference met and emerged in near unity behind McConnell who said his party will not budge on the matter.


"My view, and I can now confidently say the view shared by virtually everybody in my conference, is that the nomination should be made by the president that the people elect in the election that's now underway," McConnell told dozens of members of the Capitol Hill press corps.

Asked if he'd even meet with a nominee on a courtesy call, McConnell responded: "I don't know the purpose of such a visit. I would not be inclined to take one myself."

McConnell's hard-line stance presages a yearlong war in the Senate over the vacancy left by Justice Antonin Scalia's death. Democrats said they will make sure the matter does not fade as the election nears, while conservatives that are often critical of McConnell began backing him, giving him little incentive to back down.

Still, the issue became heated on Tuesday as the GOP leader flashed rare emotion under intense questioning from the media about how his extraordinary blockade might play politically. Democrats believe they can win back the Senate based on the issue, though McConnell said Democrats would have done the same thing under similar circumstances. But the question of when election season actually starts provoked the notoriously guarded leader into a curt response.

"We are in the election year. It will occur this November. The vacancy occurred this election year. That's what we're talking about. Thanks everybody," McConnell said as he walked back to this office.

The Democratic response to McConnell's intensifying effort to defang Obama in the last year of his presidency ranged from a somber Minority Leader Harry Reid to an angry Whip Dick Durbin to a prognosticating Chuck Schumer, who maintains that McConnell will back down. Reid said Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley is on track to be the "most obstructionist" chairman in the history of the panel — but added Democrats will not retaliate by becoming the "obstruct caucus."

"It's wrong. And I believe the American people won't stand for this. The Senate needs to do its job," Reid said. "The world's greatest deliberative body? They're not going to deliberate at all in this most important responsibility they have. All we want them to do is do their job."

But senior Republicans said they are committed to cutting off any White House effort to fill out the bench. GOP members on the Judiciary Committee wrote a letter, addressed to McConnell, explaining their rationale for holding no hearings and no votes on an Obama nominee.

"[G]iven the particular circumstances under which this vacancy arises, we wish to inform you of our intention to exercise our constitutional authority to withhold consent on any nominee to the Supreme Court submitted by this President to fill Justice Scalia’s vacancy," read the letter, which was released shortly after the meeting. "Because our decision is based on constitutional principle and born of a necessity to protect the will of the American people, this Committee will not hold hearings on any Supreme Court nominee until after our next President is sworn in on January 20, 2017."

Both McConnell and Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn then used the letter to defend the party's firm decision, bragging about the consensus among a committee filled with diverse opinions on deference to presidential nominations. Cornyn, a senior Judiciary member, also said he would not meet with a nominee Obama chooses.

"That may be their consensus view. Or the consensus between the far right and the far far right. But that is certainly not the consensus view of the American people who want the Senate to act," Schumer said of polls beginning to show the public leans toward having the Senate take up a nominee.

On the Senate floor on Tuesday morning, McConnell quoted past remarks from Democrats, including Vice President Joe Biden, Reid and Schumer, in defending his decision to prohibit confirmation of a new justice.

"Whatever [Obama] decides, his own vice president and others remind us of an essential point: Presidents have a right to nominate just as the Senate has its constitutional right to provide or withhold consent. In this case, the Senate will withhold it," McConnell said.

Democrats dismissed all those past remarks because the vacancies were hypothetical. Still, both parties appear poised to throw old quotes at each other for much of the rest of the year in explaining their positions.

"The public doesn't care about that," Schumer said of old quotes. "Don't make a darned bit of difference to the public."

The Judiciary Committee contains no vulnerable GOP incumbents, but even so they are beginning to line up behind McConnell anyway. Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.), chairman of the Senate GOP's campaign arm, said Republicans are "comfortable" going into the election behind their obstructive posture.

In an interview, Sen. Rob Portman of Ohio said he agreed that Republicans should move to block even cursory hearings.

"In this highly partisan, charged environment I think we should wait until we have the people weigh in," said Portman, who's up for a tough reelection campaign this fall in a purple state.

Over the past week, Grassley had left the door open slightly for a hearing, but the majority of his panel — from newer Sens. Mike Lee and Ted Cruz, to powerful senior Republicans like Sens. Orrin Hatch and Cornyn — urged him to block the process entirely. And once people like Sen. Lindsey Graham, who has shown deference in the past to presidential nominations, began to back barring a nominee from hearings, it seemed the deal was sealed.

"No. No. I'm following the Biden rule. If it's good enough for Joe, it's good enough for me," Graham said. "It's not going to hurt me. I think it's a good idea. I never thought I'd live to hear myself say this but I agree with Biden."

For his part, Grassley appeared to be going to great pains in avoiding the media, even shielding his face from cameras as he entered lunch.

Two moderate Republican senators, Mark Kirk of Illinois and Susan Collins of Maine, have said hearings should be held, but neither serves on the Judiciary Committee. Senior GOP aides expect several other Republicans to also call for the hearing process to begin, but predicted it will not be enough to influence Grassley or McConnell’s decision-making.

The argument made internally against a hearing is that giving a nominee a platform could backfire for Republicans and build public support for the president and his Supreme Court pick. Republicans are hoping to avoid proceedings that could drag on close to the election, and instead halt the 24/7 news coverage of the conflict as early as possible.

But Democrats believe their job is to make sure that doesn't happen, and keep the issue alive for another 8½ months.

"He hasn't seen the pressure that's going to build," Reid said of McConnell.