NPR’s veteran legal correspondent Nina Totenberg reports:
I’m told that the Republicans in the Senate actually sent some sort of a back-channel message to the White House that if it were Garland that they would confirm him if the Democrats prevail in the presidential election, that they would confirm him in the lame-duck session and that the whole caucus would be on board, that it wouldn’t be a fight.
If this is true, surely Obama consulted Hillary, and if not, she ought to raise hell (via back channels, of course) and make her own pick. If the deal is Hillary has to win the election for Obama to get his Supreme Court pick, then she deserves a piece of the action.