WASHINGTON, DC, USA (AP) — A starkly divided Senate panel yesterday weighed President Donald Trump’s Supreme Court nominee, with Republicans casting Neil Gorsuch as a fiercely independent judge and Democrats complaining that his testimony “diluted with ambiguity” makes him the wrong choice.

The Republican-led Judiciary Committee was expected to back Gorsuch and send his nomination to the full Senate, most likely on a near-party line vote.

Later on, intent on getting Trump’s pick on the high court — and securing a much-needed win for his party and the new president — Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky is likely to change Senate rules so that Gorsuch can be confirmed with a simple majority in the 100-seat chamber instead of the 60 votes now required.

Sen Lindsey Graham, R-SC, bemoaned the political turn of events, but made clear it was inevitable.

“The Senate’s traditions are going to change over this man. This says more about the Senate than it does Judge Gorsuch,” Graham told his Judiciary Committee colleagues as pre-vote speeches stretched into the afternoon.

Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, strongly defended the Denver-based appeals court judge as a fair and independent man. He said Democrats had worked to try and find fault with him, but “that fault will not stick”.

“He’s a mainstream judge who’s earned the universal respect of his colleagues on the bench and in the bar,” Grassley said. “He applies the law as we in Congress write it — as the judicial oath says, without respect to persons. And he refuses to compromise his independence.”

However, Sen Dianne Feinstein of California, the top Democrat on the panel, said Gorsuch’s answers during two days of questioning before the committee were “diluted with ambiguity”. She announced her opposition to the nominee.

“Judge Gorsuch’s views were difficult to discern because he refused to answer questions, even basic questions that had been answered by previous nominees,” Feinstein said.

Up to yesterday morning, 39 Democrats and one independent had announced they would vote to block the nomination on a procedural cloture vote — a parliamentary step to advance the nomination — and oppose the choice.