ConfirmThem

By AndrewHyman Posted in Senate Rules — Comments () / Email this page » / Leave a comment »

The following is an excerpt from a speech given recently by Senator Jon Kyl (R-AZ) about judicial nominees. This excerpt was posted by Polipundit too.

It's also been suggested that the President is nominating a new, wild variety or variant of lawyers and judges to be circuit court judges now, way out of the mainstream kind of people. This, of course is absolutely ludicrous. The kind of people that President Bush has nominated are respected jurists or lawyers. The American Bar Association, which used to be the Democrat's gold standard for approving of judicial nominees has judged all of these candidates qualified. And yet, somehow, some of our colleagues on the left say they are out of mainstream.

Now, my colleague on the Judiciary Committee, the Senator from New York, for example, has made this charge on several occasions. But I just ask, who is probably more representative of mainstream --- a single Senator from a state like, for example, New York, or the President of the United States who had to get elected with support from all over this country? I don't think you would say George Bush is out of the mainstream of this country.

Who are some of the people that he has nominated? Some are judges that have had to stand for election. For example in California and Texas. And they have received supermajorities, 70% or 80% --- I've forgotten the exact numbers --- of support from the citizens of their states. And one is a blue state. One is a red state. But when well over 50% or over 60% of the citizens in those states vote to support these judges to continue in office on their state supreme court, you'd hardly say that these nominees are out of mainstream. And yet those are, in the case of these two particular judges, Janice Rogers Brown from California, Priscilla Owen from Texas, those are two of the judges for whom this filibuster has been applied.

It doesn't make sense, Mr. President, to suggest that a tradition of this Senate to give people an up-or-down vote is all of a sudden going to be overturned because all of a sudden a President is proposing people that are wildly out of mainstream.

The full speech can be found in the daily briefing provided by Senator Frist's office.