Wicker: Black Woman Supreme Pick An Affirmative Action 'Beneficiary'
Category: News & Politics
Via: john-russell • 2 years ago • 15 commentsBy: msfreepress (Mississippi Free Press)
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
Wicker: Black Woman Supreme Court Pick An Affirmative Action 'Beneficiary'
The first Black woman to sit on the U.S. Supreme Court in history will be a “beneficiary” of affirmative action, U.S. Sen. Roger Wicker told a radio show this afternoon. The senior Republican senator from Mississippi made clear that he has no plans to vote for Biden’s yet-to-be-announced pick.
Biden has vowed to select a Black woman to replace outgoing Justice Stephen Breyer, who announced his retirement yesterday.
“The irony is that the Supreme Court is at the very time hearing cases about this sort of affirmative racial discrimination while adding someone who is the beneficiary of this sort of quota,” Wicker told host Paul Gallo on SuperTalk Mississippi Radio today, referring to a pending U.S. Supreme Court case challenging affirmative action in college admissions .
“The majority of the court may be saying writ large that it’s unconstitutional. We’ll see how that irony works out.”
‘Not A Single Republican Vote’
Wicker notably did not raise an objection when former President Donald Trump vowed to appoint a woman to replace Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg when she died weeks before the 2020 election. Instead, the GOP senator enthusiastically supported Trump’s choice , Amy Coney Barrett, despite having stated in 2016 that then-President Barack Obama should not be allowed to appoint a U.S. Supreme Court justice in an election year.
“ The person I will nominate will be someone with extraordinary qualifications, character, experience, and integrity, and that person will be the first Black woman ever nominated to the United States Supreme Court. It’s long overdue in my view,” President Joe Biden said on Jan. 27, 2022. He is seen here, left, with Vice President Kamala Harris, the first woman or Black vice president in history, at the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial in Washington, D.C. Official White House Photo by Erin ScottDespite not knowing who Biden will nominate, Mississippi’s senior senator predicted that Biden’s pick will be less palatable to Republicans like himself than the white, male justice who currently holds the seat. He compared the unannounced nominee to Justice Sonia Sotomayor, who became the high court’s first Latina justice when former President Barack Obama appointed her in 2009.
“We’re going to go from a nice, stately liberal to someone who’s probably more in the style of Sonia Sotomayor,” Wicker said. “… I hope it’s at least someone who will at least not misrepresent the facts. I think they will misinterpret the law.”
Then, he lamented that more Republicans did not turn out to help re-elect former President Donald Trump in 2020.
“You know, for those people who vote Republican and were just a little uncomfortable voting for Trump last time because they had a problem with his demeanor, this is what you get. We’ll have 30 years of a left-wing judge when we could have had, at some point, another stellar member like the three we got recently, particularly Amy Coney Barrett and Brett Kavanaugh,” Wicker said, referring to two of the three white justices Trump appointed.
In 1981, President Ronald Reagan nominated Sandra Day O’Connor as the woman to serve as a justice on the U.S. Supreme Court. He did so after vowing to put a woman on the court during his 1980 campaign. Photo courtesy Reagan Presidential Library“I guarantee you this, Paul, this new justice will probably not get a single Republican vote, but we will not treat her like the Democrats did Brett Kavanaugh. It was one of the most disgraceful, shameful things and completely untruthful things that the Democratic Judiciary majority has ever, ever done.”
When Trump nominated Kavanaugh in 2018, he faced allegations of sexual misconduct, with Christine Blasey Ford testifying under oath to the U.S. Senate that the nominee once tried to rape her at a party when he was younger. Despite her testimony, the U.S. Senate confirmed Kavanaugh with only one Republican opposing his nomination. Wicker and Mississippi’s other U.S. senator, Cindy Hyde-Smith, both voted to confirm Kavanaugh .
Reagan Promised to Appoint Woman to High Court
Even aside from Trump’s 2020 vow to appoint a woman to replace Ginsburg, Biden’s pledge to announce a historic appointment is not unprecedented. As a Republican presidential candidate in 1980, Ronald Reagan promised to appoint the first woman to the court in history. He appointed Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, a white woman.
Since then, four more women have sat on the U.S. Supreme Court, all of them white except Sotomayor.
Only two Black justices have ever sat on the U.S. Supreme Court: Thurghood Marshall , who Democratic President Lyndon B. Johnson appointed in 1967; and Clarence Thomas , whom Republican President George H. W. Bush appointed to replace Marshall in 1991. Thomas remains on the court.
Like Kavanaugh, Thomas joined the court amid allegations of sexual misconduct during his nomination, with law professor Anita Hill testifying under oath the he subjected her to sexual harassment at work.
When Biden announced Breyer’s retirement yesterday, he said he plans to announce Breyer’s replacement before the end of February.
“While I’ve been studying candidates’ backgrounds and writings, I’ve made no decisions except one: The person I will nominate will be someone with extraordinary qualifications, character, experience, and integrity, and that person will be the first Black woman ever nominated to the United States Supreme Court,” Biden said.
“It’s long overdue, in my view. I made that commitment during the campaign for president, and I will keep that commitment.”
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Roger Wicker sounds like a real asshole.
It also sounds like he is ignorant of what has transpired under previous presidents.
He is an old racist dick that should have retired long ago.
Any question of "beneficiary" of affirmative action of Biden's pick could have been avoided if he didn't feel the need to virtue signal and try to gain a few votes when he was campaigning from his basement. If he picked a qualified person that just happened to be a black woman and promoted her qualifications and not her sex or color he could have avoided the issue altogether. Just another bad choice by Joe. I think that makes it 79 in a row
Trump had very few black appointees in his government. Do you think that was an accident?
I have no clue as to what is in Donald's head and I am good with that. But that was then and this is now. I am sure Joe could have found a very qualified black woman without announcing that was a qualification.
Agreed, playing the race card should have been avoided. It would not be hard for Biden to find a very qualified black woman but he didn't have to handle it the way he did. But then again Jim Clyburn has already come out and confirmed that during the campaign he told Biden the only way that Biden would get his support was to announce he would appoint a black woman to SCOTUS. And there have been articles that Clyburn has continued to press for this all year long.
I wasn't aware of that but it does not surprise me. Just as it doesn't surprise me that the left eats their own. In this case pressuring a supreme court justice to retire after he has served his usefulness to their cause in order to make sure they get the next choice. The sad part is the supreme court is supposed to be above this.
Political extortion .... the often used DC two step
Spot on!
You know everyone recognizes (though some won't admit it) that affirmative action is a disaster when it's considered offensive to speak about it in action.
Even it's proponents are ashamed of it.
Reactionary judicial ideologue, Clarence Thomas, benefited greatly from affirmative action programs, as he admitted.
Wicker qualified under the "stupid" category.
It is not important just how you get your foot in the door, but what you do once you get through the door itself.
This action discriminates against Asian-Americans..
Maybe it's time to appoint an Asian-American to the bench, or are Asians not considered to be "qualified"?