Washington, D.C. – Joe Biden’s Supreme Court Nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson made it through her Senate Judiciary Committee hearings this week without really answering any of the tough questions surrounding her judicial philosophy or the key issue of court packing. Judge Jackson seems to have created more questions than she answered.
As Chuck Grassley – the top Judiciary Committee Republican – said, “Republicans aren’t getting the answers that we think we can, particularly on the issue of court packing.” Unlike Justice Stephen Breyer – whom Judge Jackson would replace – and the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Judge Jackson repeatedly refused to say she if she opposes packing the Supreme Court with liberal, activist judges.
And what about her judicial philosophy? Judge Jackson actually went so far as to discredit her own record saying that she does not hold a particular judicial philosophy because “the issue of constitutional interpretation in that sense does not come up very often” in her courtroom.
Judge Jackson couldn’t even answer a basic question about how to define the word “woman.”
Judge Jackson owes the Senate more answers on her judicial philosophy as well as on her soft-on-crime record. But this lack of clarity won’t stop vulnerable Senate Democrats like Maggie Hassan, Raphael Warnock, Catherine Cortez Masto, Mark Kelly, and Michael Bennet from supporting her nomination.
###