Back the 4th and final day of
judgment on Jackson Browne Jacksons
confirmation hearing wrapped
up on Capitol Hill yesterday,
a Senate committee is on track to
confirm Judge Jackson is the first
black woman to the US Supreme Court.
However, it is unlikely to
have full bipartisan support.
Some Republicans say they're skeptical
of Jackson's background like her
sentencing for child sex abusers,
9 news legal analyst Whitney trailer
joins us now to talk about the
hearings and he is not on zoom today.
Good to see you,
it's good to see you in person.
It's always be here good to see
everybody out there and I have to
give a special shout out to Tula
and Chiesa who I met last night.
So good morning to you all
there you go. Alright so anything
surprising about Judge Jackson's
confirmation hearing we know
is going to be contentious.
You know it was contentious.
I I wasn't really surprised
they they tried to attack.
They cherry picked some of her cases.
It was a little bit tough at times, but.
It's become very partisan over these years,
which is really unfortunate because
I don't think they got into.
They got into some of her cases,
but they certainly veered off and it was.
It was hard to watch because the point is,
is this person qualified and
it's just gotten so partisan that
folks will go left and right.
I mean, I think about Kavanaugh a lot.
His was was even more contentious,
so nothing overly surprising.
I thought she was poised.
I thought her answers were very thoughtful
and I thought she showed judicial.
Temperament, yeah,
you know they they asked her
about all sorts of bizarre things,
but they also did talk to her about
some of her rulings and there were
controversial enough controversy
to maybe hold this up or or not.
I don't think there's enough
controversy to hold it up.
Certainly the Republicans I guess scored
some points in the sense of trying to
highlight that she's soft on crime,
but what they did was they
really cherry picked.
I mean, she has hundreds of thousands
of cases possibly, and they took.
You know, just something here and
there where she had lesser sentencing.
Now the problem in the concern with
that Gary is that if there's a
pressure for judges to now sentence in
a certain way 'cause her sentencing
were certainly within the limits
they were just lower than some of
the Republicans 'cause they said
the prosecutors wanted more.
But if there's this sort of
public pressure for judges to now
even over sentence,
I think that could be detrimental
to our criminal justice system
if they're going to say, hey,
I'm going to be scrutinized.
Even though based on these facts and the law,
I think this is appropriate if it's
below what a recommendation is,
then folks judges may get concerned
and start over sentencing.
That's
interesting. Yeah, so almost everybody
thinks she's going to be confirmed because
the Democrats have enough votes to do
it and they are going to hang together.
So if she joined when she joins the bench,
how will that affect it?
Or will it? Because it's it's a?
It's a huge conservative majority
now you know and some people
say that's why it wasn't as
contentious because it's a.
63 Conservative majority right now,
so she's not going to tip
the balance if you will.
It it it, you know will shift slightly,
but it shouldn't make a major difference.
Now. What's interesting though,
is this will be the first time
you have four women on the bench,
which those women could then
form some sort of a contingency.
I don't see that happening
with Amy Comedy Barrett,
but the right case you could
see you know that could change
the the trajectory of of the
court in some of the rulings.
Just based on that,
which is why some people are
saying this is important to have
diversity and have different
perspectives on the bench.
Yeah,
well, talking about diversity.
I mean she made history.
She's gonna be the first
black woman on the court.
President Biden way back
when he was campaigning.
Said if I get a chance,
I'm going to put a black woman on the court.
So we've known he's going to do this.
Did that make it easier or
harder for her confirmation?
Do you think that's a great question and in
a lot of ways I think it made it harder.
'cause if you look at the
comments and if you look at the.
You know the keyboard warriors
who are on an extreme.
You know they're saying this is
affirmative action and it's really
discouraging because this candidate,
this nominee Judge Judge Jackson,
is eminently qualified.
Harvard undergrad, Harvard Law School.
She's been a judge on nearly every
level she's been in the DC circuit,
which a lot of people say is sort
of the second most powerful court.
That's where Kavanaugh was,
Clarence Thomas so.
She this is this is really significant
and I think it probably made it
harder because people will say, well,
this is just because she's black,
but they completely ignore the fact
that he said I'm going to find someone
eminently qualified which he did,
and it's interesting because when
Reagan in 1981 appointed the
first woman Sandra Day O'Connor,
he said it's time and everybody said
he's forward thinking and praised him,
President Trump when he nominated
Amy Comedy Barrett.
He also said I'm going to nominate a woman.
Everybody said he's not misogynistic
he's you know he's he's fair but now
we have a black woman and and folks
are saying oh it's affirmative action
and questioning her qualifications
and I would just encourage these
folks who are saying that to really
look at her qualifications.
I mean, she is eminently qualified,
so it's unfortunate that there's that taint.
But in a 232 year history, right,
you have 115 Supreme Court Justices,
108 have been men. Wow.
White men excuse me.
Yeah two have been black men and then
we have the she'll be the sixth woman
so there's only been five women.
So in the 232 year history when all
of these other people there were no
nominations for black people for black women,
she didn't even have an opportunity.
So for them to say this is taking an
opportunity is really, I think misplaced.
I agree.
OK, as always nice to get your views,
we appreciate it. We'll see you next Friday.
It's always good to be here. OK, thanks.