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President Barack Obama on Wednesday renominated a Cal law school dean to a seat on the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, weeks after Senate leaders cut a deal not to seek his confirmation in the final hours of the last Congress. The president first nominated Goodwin Liu, associate dean and professor at the UC Berkeley's Boalt Hall Law School, in February. Despite GOP opposition right out of the gate, the Senate Judiciary Committee held a confirmation hearing in April and voted 12-7 along party lines in May to send Liu to the full Senate for confirmation. But amid filibuster...

A Cal law school dean's nomination to a federal appeals court appears to be dead, at least for now, under a deal struck between U.S. Senate Democrats and Republicans to break a year-end judicial confirmation logjam. Officials familiar with the deal said Democrats agreed not to seek votes on the nominations of Goodwin Liu, associate dean at UC Berkeley's Boalt Hall School of Law, and three others, while Republicans agreed to confirm at least 19 of President Barack Obama's noncontroversial nominees. If confirmed, Liu, 40, of Berkeley, would be only the second Asian-American serving on a federal appeals court and...

(04-16) 19:45 PDT WASHINGTON -- Senate Republicans took turns flaying appeals court nominee Goodwin Liu at his confirmation hearing Friday, accusing the UC Berkeley law professor of planning to rewrite the Constitution to enlarge government, expand judicial power and invent new rights. The Senate Judiciary Committee's top Republican, Jeff Sessions of Alabama, said Liu's writings exemplified "intellectual judicial activism," and ridiculed his attempt to distinguish his academic role from the job he would do as a judge. Sen. Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., said Liu would bring a liberal agenda to the court, and Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, said he might have...

A top Senate Republican hammered liberal law professor Goodwin Liu’s writings as “vicious, emotionally and racially charged” at his confirmation hearing Friday – igniting the first real test of whether Republicans will be able to block the most controversial of President Barack Obama’s lower court judicial nominees. Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) slammed Liu’s testimony against Samuel Alito during his confirmation hearings for the Supreme Court. “Judge Alito’s record envisions an America where police may shoot and kill an unarmed boy to stop him from running away with a stolen purse … where a black man may be sentenced to death...

Obama Pro-Abortion Nominee for Appeals Court, Goodwin Liu, Gets Senate Hearing Washington, DC -- Despite protests from Republicans, a pro-abortion nominee President Barack Obama put forward for a federal appeals court position is receiving a hearing today in the Senate Judiciary Committee. Obama nominated pro-abortion professor Goodwin Liu for a spot on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit. http://LifeNews.com/nat6255.html

WASHINGTON -- On the eve of Goodwin Liu's confirmation hearing as a federal appeals court judge, Sen. Dianne Feinstein tore into the UC Berkeley law professor's Republican critics Thursday, saying they were smearing him and applying standards they never used for their own party's nominees. "It's attack, attack, attack. It's ruin somebody before they've had an opportunity" for self-defense, Feinstein, D-Calif., said at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing. The committee's top Republican, meanwhile, suggested Liu might be guilty of criminal contempt for failing to list some of his speeches and events he attended in the initial set of documents he...

Amid allegations that President Obama’s appeal court nominee Goodwin Liu omitted extensive information from his senate questionnaire, Republican lawmakers are gearing up to challenge his confirmation at a hearing on Friday. Liu, a nominee for the ninth circuit court of appeals, neglected to disclose 117 items on his senate questionnaire, Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee said last week. The mandatory questionnaire requires judicial nominees to disclose all organizational affiliations, speaking engagements, published work, and comments they have made to media.Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL), ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, sent a letter to the committee’s chairman Patrick Leahy (D-VT)...

In a letter to the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Associate Dean and Professor of Law at the University of California, Berkeley School of Law Goodwin Liu, a nominee to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, apologized for dozens of omissions from his Senate questionnaire. The “original submission of my Senate Questionnaire on February 24 inadvertently omitted a number of items,” Liu wrote to Sens. Pat Leahy, D-Vermont. “I would like to offer a sincere and personal apology to you, to the Ranking Member” – Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala. – “and to the entire Committee for...

WASHINGTON – Goodwin Liu couldn't speak English until kindergarten, but he went on to become co-valedictorian at Rio Americano High School in Sacramento, a Rhodes Scholar and a law professor at the University of California, Berkeley. Now he's under attack on Capitol Hill, where Republicans oppose his nomination to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco. Liu, the son of Taiwanese immigrants, is attracting far more attention than most judicial nominees. While his backers are excited by his solidly liberal credentials, some opponents fear Obama is preparing Liu for what would be a historic appointment: the first...

The ardently leftist California law school professor nominated by President Obama to become a federal appellate court judge suspiciously concealed more than 100 of his most controversial speeches, publications and other background materials from the U.S. Senate committee that screens judicial candidates. Obama’s pick to fill a vacancy on the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, UC Berkeley Professor Goodwin Liu, conveniently omitted a mountain of contentious material that could hurt his confirmation process. The records shed light on Liu’s leftist positions in areas such as “constitutional welfare rights,” affirmative action, judicial activism and immigration. The 39-year-old scholar, who has practiced...

Democrat Won't Halt Hearing on Pro-Abortion Obama Pick Goodwin Liu Washington, DC -- The top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee has said he has no plans to delay the hearing on the abortion advocate President Barack Obama selected for an appeals court position. Sen. Patrick Leahy made the decision even though Goodwin Liu failed to complete 117 items on his Senate questionnaire. http://LifeNews.com/nat6229.html

GOP Wants Hearing Delayed on Pro-Abortion Obama Judge Goodwin Liu Washington, DC -- Senate Republicans today called for a delaying a proposed April 16 hearing on pro-abortion liberal professor Goodwin Liu, whom President Barack Obama nominated for a spot on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit. Liu is a professor at the liberal University of California, Berkeley. http://LifeNews.com/nat6227.html

A Washington truism: to conservatives, potentially troublesome judicial appointments justify immediate action no matter how injurious to the smooth functioning of a legislative body. It's been this way since Roe, as Republicans have grasped how the subtle formalism of American life can be influenced by judicial rulings. And so Senate Republicans are holding up the nomination of Goodwin Liu, .. Liu presents a classic dilemma for intellectually honest conservatives: he is undeniably brilliant, undeniably qualified to serve, has a great story behind him (son of immigrants ..) , was a Rhodes scholar, went to Stanford, Yale Law) respected by colleagues...

Goodwin Liu may be poised to become the youngest judge on the nation's busiest appeals court, but he was nonetheless a late bloomer.(snip)Liu is most likely to encounter Republican ire for his testimony against Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito during his 2006 confirmation hearings. Liu co-wrote an American Constitution Society report critical of Alito's handling of death penalty cases and his views on race and due process.Two days after the announcement of Liu's nomination, the ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Alabama Republican Jeff Sessions, expressed his disappointment at the selection of someone "far outside the mainstream of American...

Goodwin Liu on Constitutional Welfare Rights—Part 2 [Ed Whelan] As shown by my Part 1 excerpts from Ninth Circuit nominee Goodwin Liu’s law-review article on “Rethinking Constitutional Welfare Rights,” Liu argues for what he calls an “interstitial” judicial role in recognizing constitutional “welfare rights” (broadly defined to include claimed affirmative rights to “education, shelter, subsistence, health care and the like, or to the money these things cost”). Liu calls for judges to engage in “socially situated modes of reasoning that appeal … to the culturally and historically contingent meanings of particular social goods in our own society” and to “determine,...

Sixteen appointees and advisers helping president-elect Barack Obama's Justice Department transition efforts all recently sat on the board of an organization little known outside legal circles: The American Constitution Society for Law and Policy. The liberal legal network, which blossomed during eight years of Democratic exile, counts as its veterans Obama’s choice for attorney general, Eric Holder: Vice President-elect Joe Biden's chief of staff, Ron Klain; and future White House Staff Secretary Lisa Brown. Seven other recent board members are advising the incoming administration on legal, education, and labor-related issues. Theresa Wynn Roseborough is rumored to be a top candidate...

by Mark Finkelstein January 13, 2006 - 07:53 Discussing the Alito hearings on this morning's Today show, Matt Lauer and Tim Russert sounded less like host and analyst and more like two teenaged boys, griping as they exit the theater that the movie didn't deliver enough exploding cars and train wrecks. Lauer's opening question sounded a theatrical theme: "did the event live up to its billing?" Russert panned the performance's lack of fireworks: "It sure didn't, Matt. People talked about a confrontation. It certainly wasn't that. It started off with a bang and ended with a whimper." But to the...