Alito and Vanguard

vanity

[airedale]

We've all heard about the pledge that Judge Alito made to recuse himself on cases involving Vanguard when he was appointed to the Appellate Court. I don't remember a pledge like this being extracted from any other judge. Exactly why and how did pledge come to exist. What were the exact terms? I certainly don't expect the MSM to report the details unless it hurt Judge Alito.

[Cyber Liberty]

Only pledge I ever heard of has something in it about defending the Constitution, or something or other....

[Brilliant]

This is like you can't decide a case involving Coca Cola if you've ever consumed a Coke.

[airedale]

It's the one they keep hammering him about.

As for the other one you know DemoRats aren't bound by that kind of pledges. I forget which one of them made that point in the hearings. I'm pretty sure it was Slow Joe Biden

[Peach]

#1. Judge Alito pledged not to rule on any case involving Vanguard for his initial term. As was pointed out in the hearings repeatedly by Republicans, there is no one on the planet who would try to bend the term "initial" to mean 12 years.

#2. The Vanguard case was about two people who sold their stock and could not decide how to split the proceeds. It had absolutely zero benefit to Alito or Vanguard shareholders how the case was decided.

#3. Alito consulted with ethics attorneys to decide how to proceed and they told him there was no reason to recuse himself.

#4. For reasons I am not altogether clear about, Alito later decided the case should be re-heard with another judge and that judge or panel of judges came to the exact conclusions he came to.

[marty60]

Ah they're all po'd they don't invest in Vanguard. Real money maker fund.

[airedale]

That's the point. It's very unusual since mutual funds are the preferred investment device for judges. If you owned shares in it then you're supposed to recuse yourself where they are involved on one side or the other. In the 2002 case Vanguard held a fund that there was an argument over how some money that Vanguard held as an investment should be distributed between two individuals. Vanguard was only involved because they needed to be told how to distribute the funds. Technically they were on one side of the case but no decision made by the courts would have had any affect on Vanguard.

[JasonC]

It is insane, Vanguard is an index mutual fund company. Judges put their assets in index funds precisely so it is obvious they are not showing favoritism to any company or sector because they are invested in it. Indexes passively invest in everything that exists. Vanguard as a company has nothing to do with the performance of those invested through it, in every company under the sun. The Dems are grasping at straws. Alito did exactly the right thing to prevent even the appearance of even the possibility of any financial conflict of interest, by putting all of his assets in passive indexes. Then they pretend he should have recused himself from a case involving the mutual fund parent. It is just nonsense, playing on people's financial ignorance.

[airedale]

#1. Judge Alito pledged not to rule on any case involving Vanguard for his initial term. As was pointed out in the hearings repeatedly by Republicans, there is no one on the planet who would try to bend the term "initial" to mean 12 years.

I know, but why did they extract this pledge? It's highly unusual for that specific a pledge.

Also what the heck does "first term" mean since federal judges are appointed for life. Was there something going on with Vanguard at the time that the senators were concerned with at the time? Did Alito or his wife (or her law firm) have ties to Vanguard that we don't know about that caused the Senate to extract this pledge?

[Peach]

Democrats try to find ANYTHING to destroy a candidate and NOTHING they have said today or yesterday about Vanguard should give you cause for concern.

If any of the questions or concerns you posed were accurate, don't you think the Rats would have aired them today? Such as "we were concerned because your wife had ties to Vanguard" sort of thing.

But they didn't do that. I would imagine the reason they even got the initial pledge about Vanguard is because he has substantial stock with that mutual fund and the Rats love to try and make anyone who owns stock (except themselves, of course) look suspect.

[writer33]

Alito's doomed, Peach. Whatever will we do? Hmmmm?

:)

[Peach]

Doomed, I tell ya :-)

[okie01]

Also what the heck does "first term" mean since federal judges are appointed for life.

In court-speak, each year is considered a "term".

Recall that, as the summer approaches, the SCOTUS is said to have "X cases to decide before the end of its term".

[writer33]

It's all over. The conservative movement is dead. And we would've got away with it if it wasn't for a bunch of meddling congressmen.

:)

[DocRock]

We're Doomed!

[RightFighter]

The phrase they used on the questionaire was not "first term". It was "initial period of service." Alito argued with The Swimmer about this at length today - stating that he didn't know exactly what is meant by "initial period of service," but that he was quite sure that 12 years later would no longer be considered in the "initial period" of his service as a judge.

At any rate, none of it matters, since he revisited his non-recusal and decided to retroactively recuse himself and asked the court to have a different panel of judges review the case.

[JustAnotherOkie]

So to follow that logic, if two kids buy candy from Wal Mart, then cannot agree how to split the candy, he should recuse himself because he stopped at Wal Mart on the way in to buy an ink pen?

That sounds logical.

[writer33]

Yeah, DocRock. That's the ticket.

:)

[Peach]

Exactly. It's not my logic, but it seems to make sense to the Rats.

[airedale]

Thanks. I could have waited until h*ll froze over before the MSM explained it.