Opinion: Sotomayor hearings: Sessions won’t back filibuster against nominee

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Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions, the top Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, said this morning that he would not support any attempt by his party to filibuster or delay a Senate floor vote on Sonia Sotomayor’s Supreme Court nomination.

Sotomayor will finish her testimony before the committee shortly and then a series of witnesses supporting and opposing her confirmation will appear before the panel.

The earliest the committee could take up the matter of her nomination is Tuesday, but it’s more likely the committee will wait to have a formal confirmation vote closer to the end of the month.

After that, it will be Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s (D-Nev.) decision as to when to schedule a floor debate and vote. But the Senate will recess for a month after the first week of August, so a vote that week is likely. That would put Sotomayor on the court in time to hear arguments in a campaign finance case in early September.

Sessions and other Republican senators have not indicated whether they will vote against Sotomayor, although many are expected to. The open question remains whether some will cross party lines to support the woman who would be the first Latina on the Supreme Court. Because Democrats hold a large majority in the Senate, her confirmation seems virtually certain.

-- James Oliphant

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