Judiciary committee couldn’t see past color
SAN DIEGO — Republicans spent the last few weeks extolling the virtues of colorblindness.
They didn’t mean it. After the confirmation hearings for Ketanji Brown Jackson, President Joe Biden’s historic choice for the Supreme Court, you would have to be totally blind not to see how color-conscious the GOP really is.
White conservatives like to appropriate Rev. Martin Luther
King Jr.’s dream that people should be judged not “by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.”
Yet, some of the Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee never got to character because they couldn’t see past color.
Jackson is currently a federal judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. If confirmed by the Senate, she would be the first African American woman to sit on the Supreme Court.
Republicans have tried to deny Biden credit and downplay the significance of this breakthrough by arguing that we should ignore race.
But what do you know? During the hearings, more than a few Republicans didn’t ignore race at all. In fact, several of them seemed obsessed with the topic. They returned to it over and over again.
• On Day 1, with his opening statement, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., set the racial tone. He told Jackson: “As to the historic nature of your appointment, I understand. But I remember Janice Rogers Brown, an African American woman [and California Supreme Court Justice nominated for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit] who was filibustered by the same people who are praising you. … Now it’s about (how) we’re all ‘racist’ if we ask hard questions. It’s not going to fly with us. We’re used to it by now. At least I am.”
• Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, insisted that GOP opposition to Jackson’s nomination has nothing to do with you-know-what. “It’s not about race,” Cruz told Jackson. “We will see Democrats and the media suggest that any senator that is skeptical of your nomination, that questions you vigorously, or that dares to vote against you must somehow harbor racial animus.”
• Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., lectured Jackson about “so-called white privilege.” Blackburn then brought up the GOP’s favorite chew toy: critical race theory. Worried that the nominee is some sort of Manchurian candidate on a mission to infiltrate the judiciary, she asked Jackson: “Is it your personal hidden agenda to incorporate critical race theory into our legal system?”
• On Day 2, Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, made reference to what are perhaps the two most racially charged Supreme Court decisions in U.S. history. He asked Jackson: “Would you agree with me that, even under an appropriate stare decisis analysis, that Dred Scott and Plessy vs Ferguson were appropriately overruled by The Supreme Court?”
• Cruz asked Jackson about “The 1619 Project.” The controversial series shepherded by New York Times journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones argues that America began not in 1776 but in 1619 with the arrival of African slaves. Cruz finds the project “deeply inaccurate and misleading.” He then asked Jackson to define critical race theory. Jackson offered a brief definition with this qualifier: “(CRT) doesn’t come up in my work as a judge. It’s never something that I studied or relied on. And it wouldn’t be something that I would rely on if I were on the Supreme Court.” Undeterred, Cruz continued to rail against CRT and what the wokesters call “anti-racism” until his time ran out.
Hard questions are fine. But, in asking them, senators must be fair and respectful. They should listen politely, and not interrupt or raise their voice. Tone is key. This is a job interview, not enhanced interrogation.
As I cringed my way through the Jackson hearings, I kept thinking that a white male nominee would never be degraded this way. Such treatment is reserved for Black women.
The GOP colorblind? Yeah, right. Open your eyes. Meanwhile, Black Twitter is on fire. Many African Americans saw the spectacle of the hearings as the political equivalent of a hate crime. Several pointed out this is what many Black women experience every day in class or at work, where they are regularly disrespected by men — especially white men. Not heard one minute, talked down to the next.
I was afraid this would happen. I held my breath. But in the end, the confirmation hearings for Ketanji Brown Jackson were not as bad as I thought they would be. They were so much worse.