As a Senate committee prepares to decide whether or not to confirm Ketanji Brown Jackson's nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court, the Senate Republican leader is voicing his opposition.
After four days of hearings, Mitch McConnell announced Thursday that he would vote against Jackson, saying he "cannot and will not" support her appointment as the first Black woman on the Supreme Court.
"I enjoyed meeting the nominee. I went into the Senate's process with an open mind. But after studying the nominee’s record and watching her performance this week, I cannot and will not support Judge Jackson for a lifetime appointment to our highest Court," McConnell said in a statement.
He gave three specific examples to support his reasoning.
First, McConnell criticized Jackson for refusing to take a position on possibly expanding the size of the nine-member court.
"The most radical pro-court-packing fringe groups badly wanted this nominee for this vacancy," he said. "Judge Jackson was the court-packers' pick. And she testified like it."
Second, McConnell questioned Jackson's judicial philosophy, saying she doesn't have a long enough "paper trail on constitutional issues."
"Judge Jackson has been on the D.C. Circuit for less than one year. She has published only two opinions," he said, adding that she would likely be an "activist judge" on the bench.
Finally, McConnell pointed to Jackson's sentencing decisions, saying she fits the Biden Administration's push to "make the federal bench systematically softer on crime."
"The Judge regularly gave certain terrible kinds of criminals light sentences that were beneath the sentencing guidelines and beneath the prosecutors' requests," he said. "Judge Jackson declined to walk Senators through the merits of her reasoning in specific cases. She just kept repeating that it was her discretion, and if Congress didn't like it, it was our fault for giving her the discretion."
McConnell's opposition was not unexpected and Jackson’s confirmation is still on track, though some analysts wonder if his declaration so soon after the Senate hearings wrapped up would lead fellow Republicans to follow suit, the Associated Press reported. Even so, Democrats could confirm Jackson without any GOP support in the 50-50 Senate, where Vice President Kamala Harris can cast the tiebreaking vote, the AP added.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer indicated that Democrats are confident they will be able to confirm the nomination, CNN reported.
"There is nothing in Judge Jackson’s record suggesting that the committee should have difficulty reporting her nomination out," he said. "There's not a shred of doubt in my mind she merits confirmation to the U.S. Supreme Court."
The Senate committee is expected to vote on Jackson's nomination by April 4.
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