Norton, CBC Send Letter to Senate Leadership Opposing Consideration of SCOTUS Nominee Before Inauguration
WASHINGTON, D.C. — Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC), chair of the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) Judicial Nomination Task Force, and CBC Chair Congresswoman Karen Bass (D-CA), today released a letter they sent to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and Senate Democratic Leader Charles Schumer (D-NY) opposing the consideration of any nominee to the Supreme Court before the next president is inaugurated.
"We must protect the legitimacy of the Supreme Court," Norton said. "If the Senate rushes to consider a nominee at this point – after voting this year has already started – it risks calling that legitimacy into question," Norton said. "Moreover, as a Member of Congress representing one of the largest Black constituencies in the country and a member of the CBC, it's critically important to me to have the time required to do due diligence on any nominee's record on racial justice."
The letter follows.
September 30, 2020
The Honorable Mitch McConnell The Honorable Charles Schumer
Majority Leader Minority Leader
United States Senate United States Senate
Washington, DC 20510 Washington, DC 20510
Dear Leader McConnell and Leader Schumer:
We write to express our strong opposition to considering Judge Amy Coney Barrett's nomination, or any nomination, to the Supreme Court with 34 days left until election day on November 3, 2020. As African American Members of Congress, we are in the process of studying Judge Barrett's opinions and writings on issues affecting people of color, but we write now in opposition to considering any nominee to the Supreme Court until after the next president is inaugurated. To consider any nominee so close to a presidential election while voting is occurring raises questions of legitimacy for the nominee and the Supreme Court itself. The process of confirming a judicial nominee to a lifetime appointment on the nation's highest court should be carefully evaluated, and not rushed through so close to a national election.
As members of the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC), a primary focus, given our history in this country, is always on ensuring equal rights for all. Our interest in the Supreme Court, as representatives of the nation's largest constituencies of African Americans, is greater than that of most Americans in light of past and continuing discrimination. Deliberation on a proposed nominee is essential for us.
We should allow the people to decide this election before the Senate acts on any nominee, especially considering that voting in the election has already begun. Polls show that a clear majority of the American people believe that a new justice should be selected after the November election. It is impossible to justify considering a nominee less than a month and a half before the election when Republicans left vacant for 10 months the seat that President Barack Obama was not allowed to fill. The vacancy at the end of Obama's term was the longest vacancy on a nine-member Supreme Court in American history.
Confirming a Supreme Court justice could leave the American people with a new justice nominated by a president who lost the popular vote in 2016 and polls show might lose both the popular and the electoral college majority this year, and confirmed by a Republican Senate whose majority is equally in doubt within days of the next election.
It does a disservice to the current nominee to proceed now as voting has begun, as she seeks to cast herself as impartial and above the politics of any given moment. It does a disservice to the American people to deprive them of a say on the Supreme Court nomination before an election that is now upon them.
Sincerely,
Karen Bass Eleanor Holmes Norton
Chair, Congressional Black Caucus Chair, CBC Judicial Nominations Task Force