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 "It's crystal clear after talking to him that Judge Garland has
both a brilliant legal mind and a heart of gold," New York Senator
Chuck Schumer, the Senate's second-ranking Democrat, told reporters
after huddling with the nominee.
Those qualities, Schumer predicted, will convince Republicans to
launch the confirmation process required to elevate Garland, an
appellate judge and former prosecutor, to the Supreme Court.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, backed by most of his fellow
Republicans, has insisted the Supreme Court vacancy resulting from
conservative Justice Antonin Scalia's Feb. 13 death be filled by
whomever succeeds Obama next January after the Nov. 8 presidential
election.
Garland on Tuesday also met with Senator Robert Casey in the
Pennsylvania Democrat's office, and will continue a string of
"courtesy calls" with Democrats.
 "I hope that if we can stay at it, maybe we will get a breakthrough
where folks (Republicans) will be willing not just to meet but to
actually cast a vote" on Garland, Casey told reporters after the
meeting.
Garland will hold private sessions with the relatively small number
of the Senate's 54 Republicans who have agreed to meet him.
McConnell has pledged to prevent any Senate floor vote on confirming
Garland and opposes Judiciary Committee hearings.
Garland, while considered a centrist, could tilt the Supreme Court
to the left for the first time in decades.
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Following Tuesday's bombings in Brussels that killed at least 30
people, Schumer noted Garland led the U.S. government's prosecution
of the two men convicted in the 1995 Oklahoma City federal building
bombing that killed 168 people.
"As someone who lives in New York who has experienced the horrors of
terrorism close up and personal, the idea of having someone on the
Supreme Court who understands those issues, as well as their
horrible human effect, is very comforting," Schumer said.
If the Senate does not act on Garland, the court vacancy could
remain unfilled at least until the early months of next year,
leaving it divided between four liberal justices and four
conservatives.
That creates the possibility of 4-4 split decisions, the first of
which came on Tuesday and left in place a lower court ruling that
two women could not sue a bank for loan discrimination.
(Reporting by Richard Cowan; Additional reporting by Lawrence
Hurley; Editing by Will Dunham)
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