In the News
Jun 8, 2009 |
Washington Post
Of the 848 asylum cases in which Sotomayor has taken part, Schumer’s aides say, she sided with the foreigner over the government in 144 of them, or 17 percent of the time. That percentage, the aides point out, is virtually identical to that of the entire 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals, of which she is a member, during a two-year window analyzed as part of a recent article published in the Stanford Law Review by law professors at Temple and Georgetown universities.
It is not surprising that her record is similar to that of the 2nd Circuit as a whole, because the court reached unanimous decisions in all but three of the asylum cases there in which she participated. In the only case in which she dissented, Schumer’s staff say, she sided with the government.
Jun 8, 2009 |
Huffington Post
While the media wallowed in the mush-brained nattering over a few out-of-context statements said to reveal Judge Sonia Sotomayor as "racist," something interesting was happening over at the place where she aspires to work.
We saw a quick glimpse of why her gender is every bit as important to the Supreme Court as her heritage. Given the stubborn issues still facing women today, perhaps even more so.
In a case brought by four women against AT&T, the Court ruled that decades-old pregnancy leaves taken under old pension rules do not have to be counted in calculating pension payouts.
Jun 8, 2009 |
Washington Post
Many leaders find that biography can be useful as a teaching tool. Biography can sometimes be a motivator. Learning about a leader's personal history can help in understanding that person outlook on contemporary problems. A big problem comes, however, when one tries to make predictions about a person's decision-making solely based on their personal history. We should have learned by now that biography is not destiny. That rule definitely applies to federal judges.
Jun 8, 2009 |
Huffington Post
A new line of attack against Judge Sonia Sotomayor holds that the Supreme Court nominee lacks impartiality because she has been a public supporter of President Barack Obama.
But Sotomayor is not the only nominee to the court who has publicly supported a sitting president. The conservatives criticizing Sotomayor seem to have forgotten Chief Justice John Roberts' close association with President George W. Bush.
Ed Whelan, president of the Ethics & Public Policy Center and one of Sotomayor's fiercest critics, declared in a post on The National Review last week that the Supreme Court nominee lacked the judicial objectivity for the job.
Jun 8, 2009 |
National Journal
The White House has indicated Sotomayor cannot answer questions on the Ricci case because of judicial ethics rules, but legal experts across the political spectrum aren't so sure….
Even though Ricci may still be pending after the court rules on it, the chances of Sotomayor seeing the case again would be slim. Nonetheless, when it comes to judicial ethics rules, even a slim chance based on unlikely scenarios and technicalities may provide ample reason for refusing to answer questions about a live case.
Jun 8, 2009 |
Washington Post
Ironically, by emphasizing Judge Sotomayor's personal history, the Obama administration and her supporters have created controversy that need not exist. By discussing her inclinations, and the reasons for them, the administration has opened the door for well-meaning believers in the Constitutional system to question her selection on the valid grounds that judging is not, and is not intended to be, lawmaking.
Jun 8, 2009 |
Washington Times
"The White House spin machine has defended Supreme Court nominee Judge Sonia Sotomayor by claiming her controversial opinions have been taken "out of context." President Obama asserted that he is "sure she would have restated" her most offensive remarks if given the chance. Both excuses fall flat. Judge Sotomayor's career has been spent promoting racial and gender preferences."
Jun 8, 2009 |
Wall Street Journal
"The Sotomayor nomination commits the cardinal sin of identity politics: It seeks to elevate people more for the political currency of their gender and ethnicity than for their individual merit. (Here, too, is the ugly faithlessness in minority merit that always underlies such maneuverings.) Mr. Obama is promising one thing and practicing another, using his interracial background to suggest an America delivered from racial corruption even as he practices a crude form of racial patronage. From America's first black president, and a man promising the "new," we get a Supreme Court nomination that is both unoriginal and hackneyed."
Jun 8, 2009 |
Forbes.com
"First impressions are important, and the Obama administration knows how to orchestrate them effectively. So it isn't surprising that the first polls about Sotomayor, conducted by Quinnipiac and Gallup, produced virtually identical positive results, with around 55% of respondents supporting her confirmation.
The importance of these early reactions is illustrated by the case of our most controversial recent nominee, Clarence Thomas. It's worth reviewing the data about him not only because both his and Sotomayor's accomplishments confirm the belief that opportunity is present for those who are willing to work hard, but also because there are so many misconceptions about Americans' attitudes toward Thomas."
Jun 8, 2009 |
Washington Post
Of course Judge Sotomayor has stirred the pot because of her one ethnically tinged comment about a wise female Hispanic judge. It should be up to Judge Sotomayor to show that, despite the facts of her personal life, she is able to act in a disinterested (i.e. non-biased) manner across a range of cases. And that is because the requirements for a judge are different than the requirements for many other positions: A judge should be prepared to uphold the law and legal precedent, even if it goes against her personal predilections and the facts of her own history. Empathy is fine but it cannot trump an even handed application of the law.
Jun 8, 2009 |
Politico
"Only 8 percent of voters agree with Rush Limbaugh and Newt Gingrich, who have said they believe Sotomayor is “racist,” and 61 percent disagree, with the rest “undecided,” according to a Research 2000 poll conducted last week for the liberal website Daily Kos.
Yet when asked the more basic question of whether Sotomayor is qualified for the Supreme Court, voters are as divided as they were on Election Day, with 54 percent saying they believe she is qualified. But broken down by party, only 15 percent of self-identified Republicans believe Sotomayor is qualified, while 80 percent of Democrats polled believe she is."
Jun 8, 2009 |
CQ
As the Senate’s consideration of Sotomayor’s nomination approaches, the NRA staff is scouring her record, Cox said. They are paying close attention to Maloney v. Cuomo, in which a three-judge panel on which she served unanimously rejected a man’s claim that a New York ban on nunchakus, a martial arts weapon, violated his Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms. The opinion stated that the amendment applies only to limitations sought by the federal government, not to those imposed by state or local governments.
Cox said “it has yet to be determined” if the NRA will use the Senate vote on Sotomayor’s confirmation as part of its rankings for senators.
Gun Owners of America, whose membership of roughly 300,000 is dwarfed by the NRA’s 4 million members, takes a much harder line on Sotomayor.
The group’s president, Larry Pratt, said a vote to confirm her would cancel out any previous pro-gun-rights votes cast by congressional lawmakers.
“She’s very hostile to the Second Amendment,” he said. “A vote for her says you don’t really support the Second Amendment. . . . It nullifies all we have achieved and hope to achieve.”
Jun 8, 2009 |
Huffington Post
As the rhetoric around Judge Sotomayor's nomination heats up, the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF) in partnership with the broad Hispanics for a Fair Judiciary coalition has launched a website, Sotomayor For Justice, to counter the misinformation and backwards logic behind opposition to this historic nomination. The website comes at a perfect time; the right has thus far done a solid job of poisoning what should be a well-informed discussion on the importance of the judiciary, and the role it plays in all of our lives.
Jun 7, 2009 |
The Hill
The White House continued to push back Sunday at critics of Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor, defending her controversial remarks and attacking opponents.
White House advisor David Axelrod, appearing on two of Sunday morning’s talk shows, said Republicans like former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.) are trying to create a diversion by focusing on comments by Sotomayor that someone of her background might make different decisions than a white male.
“The point she was making and the point the president made about the point she was making is that we're all the sum total of our experiences and you bring those experiences with you to the bench,” Axelrod said on CNN's “State of the Union” on Su
Jun 7, 2009 |
Chicago Sun Times
Jesse Jackson: "Sotomayor's judicial record reveals a moderate justice,... The notion that one's background informs one's opinions is just common sense. The very conservative justice, Samuel Alito, an Italian-American, made the same point at his confirmation hearing:"
Jun 5, 2009 |
McClatchy
"Back during his 2005 confirmation hearing, then-Judge Roberts said judges, like umpires, don't make the rules but have the limited role of applying them.
That's all well and good as far as it goes. But Wisconsin Sen. Herb Kohl, who owns a pro basketball team, rightly pointed out that "players understand that depending upon who the umpire is and who the referee is, the game can be called entirely differently."
Nevertheless, the judges-are-like-umpires comparison persists."
Jun 5, 2009 |
TCPalm.com
"Kenric Ward: Hard left turn at court” (TCPalm, May 26) relies upon this quote “Sonia Sotomayor, a federal appeals judge, is ‘the most radical of all the frequently mentioned candidates,’ said Roger Pilon of the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank based in Washington."
However, a reliable source, SCOTUSBLOG’s Tom Goldstein, found that “Judge Sotomayor rejected discrimination-related claims by a margin of roughly 8 to 1. Of the roughly 75 panel opinions rejecting claims of discrimination, Judge Sotomayor dissented 2 times.”
Jun 5, 2009 |
Forward
"Beyond the symbolism is the substance of a judicial nominee, and here Sotomayor appears to be a wise, steady choice, ... What we don’t need is to get bogged down in a silly sidebar on whether it is somehow nefarious for Sotomayor to allow her “personal politics, feelings or preferences” to unduly influence her judicial decisions, as several Senate Republicans said, identically, within hours of her nomination. Are we to believe that Chief Justice Roberts, who worked only in the Reagan White House and as a corporate lawyer before becoming an appellate court judge, hasn’t allowed his personal experiences and feelings to influence his decisions in favor of executive power and corporate defendants? Is any judge divorced from life as it is lived?"
Jun 5, 2009 |
Trentonian [NJ]
"Sotomayor seems to have been adhering to precedent, not indulging in the sort of judicial activism ...if the law is indeed “a ass, a idiot,” it’s nevertheless still the law. And Judge Sotomayor can hardly be castigated for adhering to it, least of all by conservatives."
Jun 5, 2009 |
USA Today
"some things should be off limits. Loaded racial invective is one of them."
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