Nomination of Ketanji Brown Jackson

Floor Speech

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Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I come here with real pleasure, pride, excitement, joy, and real exuberance not often felt on the floor of the U.S. Senate because we are going to be making history this week. As confident as I am of anything ever in the U.S. Senate happening, this week we will confirm Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson as an Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.

Let me, first of all, thank President Biden for nominating her. His wisdom and courage are one of the reasons that she is before us as a nominee in this historic vote. And to all my fellow Members of the Judiciary Committee, we have labored a long time, through many hours, and I particularly thank Senator Durbin for his leadership.

Now, ``historic'' is a word that is often overused, even in this Chamber, where a lot of history is made, but Judge Jackson's nomination truly merits that word. It is a joyous, exciting moment for all Americans because Justice Jackson will make the U.S. Supreme Court look more like America and, hopefully, think more like America at a time when Black women and people with diverse backgrounds, races, religions have broken many barriers.

Her confirmation will be a giant leap into the present. She stands on the shoulders of many who have come before her, as she recognized so explicitly in our hearing. One of them is Constance Baker Motley, a daughter of New Haven, CT, the first Black woman to argue before the U.S. Supreme Court and the first Black woman to be appointed as a judge on the U.S. district court.

Now, she was also instrumental in the well-known and profoundly significant case of Brown v. Board of Education, argued by Thurgood Marshall, and she won every one of the cases that she argued before the U.S. Supreme Court. I have argued four; she argued ten. Her record surpasses almost any of the litigators who have become judges.

Not only will she be the first Black woman on the U.S. Supreme Court, Justice Jackson will be the first public defender. What does that mean? She has represented people who couldn't afford a lawyer. There is nobody on this Court who has represented people who couldn't afford a lawyer as a full-time profession or public defender. She has more experience as a trial lawyer and a trial judge combined than anybody on the U.S. Supreme Court now and probably over the last century.

She has academic credentials that are superlative. She has written and taught and counseled in ways that give her insights into the real- life meaning of the law and its real impact on people.

It has also given her an emotional intelligence. There is no question that she is qualified by virtue of intellect and intelligence. Book smart--there is no question that she is book smart, but she is also people smart. She understands, as Justice Breyer has, as well, that all of these abstruse legalisms, all of the abstract concepts in law, all the technical distinctions, all of the verbiage--they have a real-life impact when they are words in a statute, when they are words in a legal opinion, when they are words from the mouths of judges or Justices--Federal or State. She understands that real-life impact, which gives her more than intellect. It gives her emotional intelligence.

I will say that I have talked to Judge Jackson about her feelings, her instincts at critical decision points as a judge. In sentencing, when she knew that another person's life was in her hands, metaphorically, and when another person's future was within her decision-making power, she has looked at sentencing decisions with all of the data points, all of the emotional intelligence, all of the judgment that she has advanced so movingly in her conversations with us, as well as her appearance before our committee.

She has that capacity for empathy that very few people have. A lot of people can go to school and can graduate with honors. They can be book smart, but she understands the impact of law on real lives and real people. It is those people whose lives are touched by the justice system. Whether they are victims or criminal defendants or litigants dealing with personal or professional conflict, their stories shone through her conversations with us and her testimony before our committee and her enthusiasm for the law, because judges are the face and voice of justice, and representation matters.

It matters for the legitimacy and credibility of our judicial system that our judges look like America, that somebody coming into a courtroom sees that that Justice has that face and voice that can relate to them.

Judge Jackson will bring to the U.S. Supreme Court all those immensely important qualities and, certainly, she will bring a lot of patience and perseverance. She has shown those qualities, but also grace and dignity, in the way that she responded to some of the abusive, demanding questions that she was asked during our hearing. She has weathered that storm with extraordinary distinction and diligence. When some of our colleagues went low, she went high, to paraphrase Michelle Obama.

When she was attacked for not claiming a ``judicial philosophy,'' she pointed to the decisions and opinions and disclaimed a judicial philosophy, just as Chief Justice Roberts did when he was asked in his hearing about judicial philosophy and he said he had no ``overarching judicial philosophy'' and, instead, described his role as ``call[ing] balls and strikes.''

She said she knew her lane. She does, indeed, know her lane. She maybe didn't use the same terminology, but it is that objectivity and impartiality that Chief Justice Roberts described that will also guide her as a matter of principle and philosophy.

There were other criticisms of Judge Jackson, and one conservative commentator described these attacks as ``meritless to the point of demagoguery.'' He was right. The concocted outrage, the straw man, the old grievances, the ancient complaints about past hearings and the treatment of nominees, all will fade and be forgotten because what shone through her performance was her integrity, her depth and warmth, her grace and dignity.

Far from being soft on crime, very movingly, she described what it is like to have a family member who walks a beat because her brother is a cop and her uncle, a chief of police. She described the worries, concerns, even fear that family members have when their relatives are police--when their brother or uncle puts himself in harm's way. And that is probably the reason she has been endorsed by the largest rank- and-file enforcement organization in the country, the Fraternal Order of Police, as well as the International Association of Chiefs of Police, high-ranking officials from the Department of Justice, and nearly 100 former assistant U.S. attorneys, many of whom observed her work as a judge firsthand.

Some may have tried to smear her, but they failed abysmally, fortunately. She had a reversal rate of about 2 percent, well below the rate that the average district judge has in the DC Circuit. And she has been endorsed, as well, by former colleagues who were appointed by Republican judges--well-respected conservative judges who disagreed with her in the outcome of cases but who deeply respected the way she called those balls and strikes in the best and truest sense of the term.

And she has shown her independence. She has ruled for and against the Trump administration. She has ruled for and against labor and collective bargaining, for and against qualified immunity, for and against class certification, because her philosophy and her ``methodology,'' to use her word, is to follow the facts and the law, and that is what she will do as a Justice on the U.S. Supreme Court.

Let me just finish, finally, with, maybe, what I think is going to be most important about Justice Jackson.

She is a unifier and a consensus builder. She is someone who can build bridges among colleagues and even adversaries. She has been confirmed on a bipartisan basis three times already by the Senate because she is a bridge builder, and the Court needs a bridge builder now more than ever. It has been politicized and polarized in a way that undermines respect and trust in the American people. Partly, it is the self-inflicted wounds of the Court, which have been dominated in many decisions by a far-right coalition that have made it look political, and that perception is deeply important because the Court's trust and respect depend on the public perceiving it to be above politics.

So the Court has inflicted wounds on itself, but so have the Congress and the political branch inflicted wounds on the Court by dragging it through a seemingly political process and making nominations and appointments seem to be the result of partisan politics, so that it may be perceived as just another political branch.

I said at the very start that I have reverence for the Court and deep respect for it as an institution. It has no armies or police. It has no power of the purse. Its authority depends on its credibility.

My hope is that Judge Jackson as Justice Jackson will help elevate it in a way that it needs now more than ever. I asked her about a code of ethics for the U.S. Supreme Court, and she said she would talk to her colleagues about it. I feel she has an understanding of the need now for the Court to adopt a code of ethics.

It is the only judicial body that lacks a code of ethics. It has none. Unlike the appellate courts, the district courts, the U.S. magistrate, the court of claims--all of the minor judicial bodies in the United States--it has no code of ethics because it has resisted a code of ethics. Its credibility now depends on its having a code of ethics.

Recent events have severely imperiled credibility and trust, and that peril will grow as more becomes known about some of these events. But the Court can help itself by supporting a code of ethics rather than resisting it.

Judge Jackson's commitment to talk to her colleagues about it is a very welcome and important step. She said it in response to a question that I asked. I was the only member of the committee to ask about a code of ethics--surprisingly, to me. But restoring credibility and trust will be important to our Nation. Her service will help restore and inspire confidence. Her presence and active participation on the Court will help that task of reinvigorating credibility and trust.

Her confirmation will be, indeed, a giant leap forward into the present and the future. It will inspire lots of young girls, lots of young women, lots of Black women, lots of Americans to believe in the American dream and to believe and see the law in different ways. That is what one of the young girls who wrote to Judge Jackson said in her letter, indeed, that she would look at the law in a different way.

We will look at the law in a different way, and we will look at the Court in a different way because the Court will look and hopefully think more like America.

I am looking forward to that vote. I will never cast a vote in this body that I am more proud and excited to do.

I thank all of my colleagues on both sides of the aisle, and hopefully there will be more on the other side of the aisle joining us for this historic achievement for our Nation.

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