WASHINGTON -- Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski met Tuesday with Judge Merrick Garland, President Obama's nominee for the Supreme Court, but did not weigh in on whether he would be a qualified candidate.
Murkowski, who chairs the Energy and Natural Resources Committee, was not swayed in her support for Senate leaders' insistence that they will not consider any nominee offered by Obama in his final year in office.
"Senator Murkowski continues to respect the Judiciary Committee's decision not to hold hearings, but hopes Judge Garland now has a greater understanding of Alaska as a result of their conversation," the senator's spokeswoman, Karina Petersen, said in an email about the meeting.
Obama nominated Garland, currently chief judge for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, on March 16 to fill the vacancy left by the death of Justice Antonin Scalia.
Murkowski has danced the line in her opinion on whether an Obama nominee should be considered by the Senate, saying at one point a hearing would be warranted but that a vote of the full Senate is perhaps not.
Murkowski joined a growing string of GOP lawmakers to meet with Garland. She met Garland in her Capitol office for a little more than 30 minutes, Petersen said. That meeting came the same morning that Garland had breakfast with Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, chair of the Judiciary Committee. Garland was scheduled to meet Wednesday with Sen. Angus King, I-Maine, who co-chairs the Arctic Caucus with Murkowski.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has made it clear he has no intention of wavering in opposition to any Obama nominee, and Murkowski and other Republican senators have closed ranks in support.
Petersen, noting that Garland remains chief judge on the D.C. Appeals Court, said Murkowski "used the meeting as an opportunity to share the importance of protecting Alaskans' Second Amendment rights, our access to public lands, and resource development around the state."
She also "raised Alaska-specific laws such as (the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act, the Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act), as well as the recent Sturgeon decision," and "hopes Judge Garland now has a greater understanding of Alaska as a result of their conversation," Petersen said.