Carl Hulse for the NYT:

Senator Jeff Flake was startled a few months ago when a constituent pressed him on whether he was willing to hold up any Supreme Court nominee chosen by Hillary Clinton if she was elected president.

“I asked for how long, and he said for four years,” Mr. Flake, an Arizona Republican, recounted in an interview. “I said no, of course not. That is not what I came to Washington to do.”

But that’s precisely what some of his Republican colleagues are considering. Having already blocked President Obama’s nominee to replace Justice Antonin Scalia since March, they contend that Republicans should indefinitely stall any nomination by Mrs. Clinton to prevent an ideological shift in the court. Such a blockade would represent a major escalation in the judicial wars that have been waged in the Senate since the 1980s.