Outside the Beltway

Miers Misses Questionnaire Resubmit Deadline

James Joyner · Thursday, October 27, 2005 · 1 comment

NPR is reporting that Supreme Court nominee Harriet Miers did not turn her revised questionnaire in to the Senate Judiciary Committee by yesterday’s deadline. I’ve been able to verify this with other reports but, strangely, none of the major print media are playing that up.

For example, it is buried near the end of a NYT report entitled “Nominee Is Pressed on Her Abortion Views”

At 8 p.m. Wednesday, a spokesman for the Senate Judiciary Committee said Ms. Miers had not yet met its deadline to submit new answers to a judicial questionnaire. Senator Charles E. Schumer, Democrat of New York, called the missed deadline another in a series of disappointments.

Similarly, one has to read deep into a Seattle Times piece called “Miers’ troubles multiply; will she survive?” to get this:

The White House, meanwhile, kept the Judiciary Committee waiting late last night for answers to a written questionnaire on Miers’ background and views, delaying release of the information by a day. “It was due at 6 o’clock,” Specter said on PBS’ “The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer.” Specter asked Miers last week to revise her answers to the questionnaire after he and the committee’s top-ranking Democrat, Patrick Leahy of Vermont, called her first version inadequate.

White House spokesman Dyke denied that Miers missed a deadline. “It was due today, and it will be delivered today,” he said Wednesday night.

The 11th-hour work on the questionnaire underscored its significance for Miers. “If she does a good job on the questionnaire, I think it puts her in good stead for the hearing,” said Leahy.

We also get this from a rather weak plea for “Someone [to] please save Harriet Miers!” from a gay publication called “Houston Voice Online:”

Miers’ first set of answers to a Senate questionnaire was haughtily rejected and her “do-over” apparently wasn’t even submitted by the Wednesday deadline. Even her “get to know you” Senate visits were halted by handlers because they seemed to be hurting her prospects.

NPR reported that there was no indication that the answers were submitted at all last night but it may simply be a function of the Senate’s press office being closed.

In any case, this is not a good sign for Miers. Either it is yet another fumble on her part or that of her support team or it is an indication that her nomination is going to be withdrawn.