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WASHINGTON (AP) -- Sen. Chuck Grassley — farmer, onetime sheet metal shearer, six-term senator and Judiciary Committee chairman — has a major say in whether President Barack Obama's Supreme Court nominee even gets a hearing.So far, the 82-year-old Iowa lawmaker has delivered a somewhat muddled message.Hours after Justice Antonin Scalia's death one week ago, Grassley issued a statement that echoed his Republican leader, Mitch McConnell. "It only makes sense that we defer to the American people who will elect a new president to select the next Supreme Court justice," Grassley said.But three days later, Grassley said on a conference call with reporters that he would "wait until the nominee is made before I would make any decisions" on whether to hold a hearing. "In other words, take it a step at a time," he said.He's repeated the "step at a time" refrain throughout the week on his multiple stops in Iowa, part of his pledge to visit all of the state's 99 counties each year.By late Thursday, Grassley and McConnell had penned an op-ed in The Washington Post, saying the American people should have a chance to decide on the justice through voting in the next election, "rather than a lame-duck president whose priorities and policies they just rejected in the most-recent national election."The same day, Grassley and Obama discussed the nomination process over the phone, according to the White House. A Grassley spokeswoman would only describe the call as cordial, and would not say whether the committee will hold hearings. Obama also called McConnell.
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Topic: All eyes on Iowa's Grassley for Supreme Court nominee's fate (Read 219 times)
