Supreme Court nominee Jackson says she would recuse herself from Harvard affirmative action case

Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) passionately praised Jackson for her professional accomplishments and personal character after both had been brought into question for days by Republican lawmakers.

Booker, New Jersey’s first Black U.S. senator, said being a Black woman in America means that Jackson regularly faced obstacles in her life that none of the lawmakers criticizing her ever had to overcome.

“You are a person that is so much more than your race and gender,” he told the judge as she dabbed her eyes with tissues. “You’re a Christian, you’re a mom.”

Booker’s impassioned speech praising Jackson and her history-making nomination — meant to uplift what had become a tense and at times ugly atmosphere in Hart 216 — definitely made members of the audience emotional. Lots of sniffles were heard around the room — which some later confirmed were tears. Jackson herself was brought to tears and used a tissue to wipe at her eyes as Booker spoke. Committee Democrats later tweeted: “There was barely a dry eye in the Senate Judiciary Committee just now. That’s what happens when you have a nominee who inspires this nation — just like @SenBooker inspires us every day.”

Late Wednesday afternoon, all but one Republican senator on the committee put forward a request to Durbin for all presentencing reports from the child pornography cases Jackson handled as a judge.

Those documents are typically sealed and contain highly sensitive personal information, and Durbin said he would not get involved in releasing such documents to senators.

“I would suggest that the information contained in these reports is dangerous, dangerous to the victims and to the innocent people who are mentioned in these reports, and unnecessary at this point,” Durbin said. “It’s never been requested by this committee, and it’s merely a fishing expedition in dangerous territory, classified settings, redacted versions, of the reports.”

Republican members of the Senate Judiciary Committee have zeroed in on Jackson’s service on the board of a D.C. private school during her Supreme Court confirmation hearing.

Sen. Marsha Blackburn (Tenn.) complained that the school tells children they “can choose their own gender and teaches them about so-called White privilege.” Sen. Ted Cruz (Tex.) said the school, which also educates Jackson’s daughter and is known for its focus on social justice and diversity, “is filled and overflowing with critical race theory.”

Sen. Ben Sasse didn’t name names, but shortly after his fellow Republicans Graham and Ted Cruz (Tex.) repeatedly interrupted Jackson and tangled with Durbin, the Nebraska Republican called out performative behavior.

“I think we should recognize that the jackassery we often see around here is partly because of people mugging for short-term camera opportunities,” Sasse told Jackson during his turn questioning the judge.

Sasse has been critical in the past of Republicans and Democrats, calling out some by name. Last year, Sasse said Reps. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.), Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) aren’t “serious adults.”

As Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) tried to pressure Jackson for the second day in a row on her approach to sentencing, accusing her of being too lenient in sex offense cases involving minors, Jackson said she regretted how much time in her hearings had been spent discussing the issue.

“What I regret is that in a hearing about my qualifications to be a justice on the Supreme Court, we have spent a lot of time focusing on this small subset of my sentences,” Jackson said.

Jackson has repeatedly answered questions from Republican senators about her sentencing decisions on child pornography cases. More often than not, the questions are the same, and she gives the same answers. Conservative senators have hinged on the issue to portray Jackson as not tough enough on crime.

Jackson’s disclosure that she would recuse herself from the Supreme Court’s affirmative action case because of her Harvard ties is perhaps not surprising because of the way she has handled questions of recusal as a trial court judge. Jackson, whose term on Harvard’s board expires in May, went out of her way as a District Court judge to disqualify herself from handling several cases, even when ethics experts said it was not necessary, and cited her concern that her impartiality might be questioned.

Sen. Ted Cruz’s (R-Tex.) allotted questioning time Wednesday devolved into a chaotic shouting match as he accused Jackson of not answering his questions, and then continually interrupted her whenever she started to respond.

Like many other GOP senators, Cruz tried to suggest that Jackson was lenient on child pornography offenders, a line of attack that fact-checkers and Democrats have debunked and criticized. Jackson has repeatedly said that as a judge, she applied discretion to each case based on its circumstances and that her overall record showed that her sentencing decisions were consistent with what the law recommended.

Biden, who has watched some of the confirmation hearings, is impressed with how Jackson has “dismantled bad faith conspiracy theories” about her record, the White House said Wednesday.

Aboard Air Force One, deputy White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters that Biden is proud of Jackson for displaying intellect, grace and character during the hours of testimony.

“The president was also impressed with how she dismantled bad faith conspiracy theories that have been fact-checked by major media outlets and experts, like some of you all here,” Jean-Pierre said. “And moderates in both parties are now dismissing them for the fringe smears that they are.”

Jackson said that, if confirmed to the Supreme Court, she plans to recuse herself from a case examining the role race can play in Harvard University’s admissions policies because she serves on the governing board for her alma mater.

It was the first time Jackson had publicly stated what she planned to do in the case, which some GOP senators had highlighted as a potential conflict of interest after her nomination.

“If you’re confirmed, do you intend to recuse from this lawsuit?” Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) asked Jackson Wednesday afternoon.

The real-life Supreme Court intruded into the Ketanji Brown Jackson hearings when the Supreme Court announced Wednesday that it was overturning a decision by the Wisconsin Supreme Court to impose legislative redistricting maps drawn by the state’s Democratic governor. Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) used it as an example of the court’s “shadow docket,” in which the court rules on important decisions brought to it on an emergency basis. Klobuchar read from the dissent by Democratic-appointed Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan but did not ask Jackson to comment.