Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, has refused to postpone nominations hearings scheduled later this month while the Senate is out of session.

In letters to ranking member of the panel Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., and other Democrats on the committee, Grassley rejected a Democratic demand to postpone hearings and accused the minority party of breaking a deal.

“I twice accommodated the Ranking Member’s requests to postpone the nominations hearing originally scheduled for September 26,” Grassley wrote in the letter to Democrats. “I further agreed to her request to postpone the nominations hearing originally scheduled for October 10.

"The Ranking Member [Feinstein] consented to holding nominations hearings on October 10, 17, and 24 with full awareness that the Senate could go into recess and further agreed not to object to the scheduling of these hearings. I will not agree to this last-minute withdrawal from our agreement and will not further delay the hearing.”

Earlier on Monday, Democrats on the committee urged to reschedule nominations hearings slated for Oct. 17 and 24 “with controversial nominees for the Fourth and the Ninth Circuits.”

“The Committee has never before held nominations hearings while the Senate is in recess before an election,” the Democrats wrote in a letter to Grassley. “The handful of nominations hearings that have been held during a recess have been with the minority’s consent, which is not the case here — in fact, we were not even consulted. In addition, three of us on the Democratic side represent the Ninth Circuit, and are unable to return to Washington for a day due to commitments in our states.”

“Holding hearings during a recess, when members cannot attend, fails to meet our constitutional advice-and consent obligations,” the Democrats added. “We respectfully request these hearings be postponed until after the recess.”

But Grassley claimed that it was “false” that the minority wasn’t consulted about the scheduling of the hearings, and provided his staff’s correspondence with Feinstein’s staff about the hearings slated for October. He claimed that Feinstein “did not condition her agreement on the Senate being in session.”

“Finally, you say that some members have scheduling conflicts. But the Ranking Member agreed to schedule these hearings for October 17 and 24 before the Senate went into recess,” Grassley wrote. “If any conflicts arose after the Senate went into recess, it is up to members to determine how to resolve them.”

Senate Republicans have remained determined to move forward confirming President Trump’s judicial nominees. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said that the Senate would not “leave behind” judges during this Congress.

“We are not going to leave any judges behind at the end of the year, when we get through this Congress,” McConnell told the Washington Examiner last week.