GOP candidates: Wait on new justice

The next president should nominate the successor to U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, the Republican candidates for president said Saturday during the last debate before the S.C. GOP primary.

Scalia, the longest serving justice at 30 years and the leading conservative voice on the Supreme Court, died in his sleep Saturday while visiting Texas. He was 79.

Scali’s death was reported 4 1/2 hours before the GOP debate at Greenville’s Peace Center.

The first question the six remaining GOP candidates received was who should pick Scalia’s successor — Democratic President Barack Obama, who has 11 months left in office, or the next president.

“If (Obama) were to nominate somebody, let’s have him pick somebody that is going to have unanimous approval and such widespread approval across the country that this could happen without a lot of recrimination,” Ohio Gov. John Kasich said. “I don’t think that’s going to happen. I would like the president to just, for once here, put the country first here.

“We’re going to have an election for president very soon, and the people will understand what’s at stake in that election,” Kasich said. “And so I believe that the president should not move forward, and I think we ought to let the next president of the United State decide who is going to run that Supreme Court with the vote of the people.”

Obama said before the debate Saturday that he plans to “fulfill my constitutional responsibilities” to nominate a successor to Scalia “in due time.” He added he expects the Senate, which must confirm court nominations, to give his selection a timely vote.

“These are responsibilities that I take seriously as should everyone,” the president said. “They are bigger than any one party. They are about our democracy. They are about the institution to which Justice Scalia dedicated his professional life.”

In Saturday’s debate, New York billionaire Donald Trump called Scalia’s death a tremendous blow to conservatism and the country, adding no one can block Obama from nominating a justice.

“He’s going to do it whether I’m OK with it or not,” said Trump, the winner of the New Hampshire primary and the front-runner in South Carolina’s primary, next Saturday. “It’s up to (Senate Majority Leader) Mitch McConnell and everybody else to stop it. It’s called delay, delay, delay.”

McConnell, R-Kentucky, said the Senate should wait for the next president to weigh a Scalia successor so voters have a say in the next choice.

U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, warned the nation’s top court could be tilted to strike down gun-ownership laws and efforts to restrict abortion, and approve bans on religious liberty.

“The Senate needs to stand strong and say, ‘We’re not going to give up the U.S. Supreme Court for a generation by allowing Barack Obama to make one more liberal appointee,’ ” Cruz said during the Greenville debate.

Then the senator, who won the Iowa caucus and is the second choice in S.C. polls, made a pitch for Palmetto State voters, saying he was the one candidate who would nominate “principled constitutionalists” like Scalia to the Supreme Court.

U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla,. said the debate over the timing to pick a successor for Scalia showed the importance of the presidential election for Republicans, who are trying to regain the White House.

“Someone on this stage will get to choose the balance of the Supreme Court,” said Rubio. “It will begin by filling this vacancy, and we need to put people on the bench who understand the Constitution is not a living and breathing document. It is to be interpreted as originally meant.”

Retired Maryland neurosurgeon Ben Carson reiterated his call to end lifetime court appointments, saying life expectancies have increased over the years. Carson also called for national healing after reading criticism of Scalia in the wake of his death.

“We’re not going to get healing with President Obama,” Carson said.

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush said he would pick Supreme Court nominees based on their judicial record, rather than apply a litmus test. He said that could avoid appointing justices who make different rulings than the president expects.

“The problem, in the past, is that we have appointed people thinking you can get it through the Senate because they didn’t have a record,” Bush said. “The problem is that we’re sometimes surprised.”

This story was originally published February 13, 2016 at 11:02 PM with the headline "GOP candidates: Wait on new justice."