Leading Senate Judiciary Committee member Charles Schumer, D-NY, said Sunday that it was too early to rule out a filibuster of Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito, even though Committee Democrats failed to land a glove on Alito during a week of tough questioning.
Asked if "the filibuster option was dead in this case," Schumer told "Fox News Sunday's" Chris Wallace: "We're still finishing the process. Written questions have to be answered. I submitted a whole bunch. So it's premature to say anything till we fully assess the record."
Appearing on the same show, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-SC, predicted that if Democrats filibuster Alito, "there would be a huge backlash in this country . . . That would not be advising and consenting, that would be hijacking the [last year's presidential] election."
Asked if Alito was "more out of the mainstream than Ruth Bader Ginsburg," Schumer said: "He may well be. And that's the fundamental question that we are assessing right now."
The Ginsburg comparison rankled Graham, who complained: "Ruth Bader Ginsburg went through the Senate with 96 votes. No one put up her writings or her associations to try to smear her. No one on our side held her views [supporting] Roe v Wade against her."
In previous interviews Graham has noted that Justice Ginsburg had been the chief legal counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union and had once written in favor of lowering the age of consent for women to twelve.
Graham said that the goal of Alito's opponents was to "overturn the election and take away from President Bush the rights that President Clinton enjoyed - and it's not going to happen."
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