Posted on 04/07/2017 1:06:39 PM PDT by pogo101
Rank your recommended "List of 21" nominees for any future Trump SCOTUS nominations! (Obviously we are recommending "in the abstract," i.e., without knowing what the current political weather will be when a vacancy arises. If another "Access: Hollywood" recording comes out, Trump will be hard-pressed to pick a woman, etc.)
My considerations, in order of importance, are:
1. Clearly constitutionalist. If we blow it on this point, the rest doesn't matter. Never forget that Brennan, Warren, Blackmun and Souter were all REPUBLICAN nominees.
2. Sufficiently non-controversial, so that we don't lose squish GOP Senators like Collins and Murkowski. (This will move downward in priority if the GOP has more than its current 52 seats when the next vacancy arises.)
3. Youth (or more precisely, how long the nominee is likely to serve)
4. Charisma -- how well will the nominee impress moderate voters?
5. Is picking this judge going to help Trump / the GOP down the road? (E.g., picking Gorsuch, from Colorado, may help swing that purple state into the red.)
Before we offer our opinions, note two things:
1. Neil Gorsuch was a 10/10 on all of these factors; and 2. I'm limiting my choices to Trump's "List of 21," but neither you nor Trump necessarily need do so.
1. Thomas Lee, UT Supreme Court, 53. Diamond-solid on constitutionalism, more so perhaps than anyone on the list under the age of 60. Clerked for Thomas. Prolific writer and good persuader-of-fellow-Justices. Downsides: No "diversity" bonus; Utah is solid red already; and his brother, Sen. Mike Lee, would have to recuse himself from consideration of his brother's nomination.
2. David Stras, MN Supreme Court, 42. Clerked for Luttig then Clarence Thomas. Yeah, another white dude (so not much "diversity"), but like Gorsuch he is an affable law professor and will be hard to demonize. And Minnesota is an increasingly purple state.
3. Allison Eid, CO Supreme Court, 52. Another Thomas clerk. Looks like a soccer mom; affable, gregarious. Partial downside: We just confirmed a Coloradan!
4. Amul Thapar, District of Kentucky federal trial judge (about to be elevated to Sixth Circuit), 47. Frequent Federalist Society speaker. It will be hard for Dems to Bork the first Indian-American nominee.
My picks assume that Trump is not in deep doo-doo politically. If he is, there are some great "fallback" picks on his "list of 21" that, largely because they are much older, will be harder to reject. (That's what Obama was thinking with Merrick Garland, by the way.)
Time and winning heals all wounds. I just couldn’t sustain my anger at Cruz.
Cruz would be a HELL of a SCOTUS Justice. Knows the USC inside and out and will NOT let it get crapped on like the ugly 4 (+ Roberts at least once) have!
I thought about Cruz, and I think he’d vote the “right” way as a Justice. And he’s only 46. My concerns are:
1. Inasmuch as Cruz has pissed off so many of even the GOP Senators, how sure can we be that at least a few of them won’t wander off to reject him?
2. I don’t think — just my gut here — that he’d be good at persuading fellow Justices in close cases.
Right now there isn’t another vacancy so they should focus full steam ahead on filling the vacancies in the appellate and district courts...while the map looks good for 2018, nothing is a guarantee. We know we have the majority now and should use it while we know we have it.
Of course; this vanity is just my entirely impractical brainstorming.
There is an overlap, however: Judge Thapar, one of the "list of 21" judges, was just nominated for the 6th Circuit. He and other "list" judges (among others, surely) may get seats in the federal Courts of Appeals between now and the next SCOTUS vacancy. It's good to have them go through the Senate confirmation process PRIOR to any SCOTUS nomination, as Gorsuch helped to illustrate.
True, but something tells me DT WILL GET 2 more.
I think Cruz is the easiest to get confirmed (Rule 19, Senate Comity and all that). Trump would have to come up with an explanation for why he’d put “Crooked, Lying Ted” on SCOTUS.
I really don’t care what Trump does over the next 8 years, so long as we get 2 more at bats for SCOTUS.
Except for Syria we have been winning everyday for 76 days.
I’ll forgive Syria easily.
Needs to be a woman, that will keep the moderates on board and might bring some Dems on board too. Especially if it happens before the 2018 elections
Zombie Ginsberg’s head will rot off sooner rather than later. Not sure who else you expect to go.
5. Is picking this judge going to help Trump / the GOP down the road? (E.g., picking Gorsuch, from Colorado, may help swing that purple state into the red.)
Suggested addition: Is picking this judge going to help the United States of America down the road?
Kennedy's summer 2017 retirement decision is widely rumored and well-sourced to former clerks of his. He (Kennedy, age 80) is over the moon that Gorsuch, a former Kennedy clerk, was nominated by Trump -- giving Kennedy the confidence that his (Kennedy's) own replacement will be a solid one like Gorsuch.
Breyer's no spring chicken either at 78.
People around here seriously need to start thinking like this is Chess and not checkers.
So many here say “No” to Cruz, then silent on Gorsuch. Well I mightily hope that Gorsuch is okay with his Episcopalian gay friendly church, but we don’t really know, do we?
We know Cruz, warts and all. So those who are okay with an unknown because you don’t like Cruz — people think there is some ideal or close to perfect (this also happens when visualizing some unknown potential mate) — wake up. Please.
I don’t think Cruz has any interest in SCOTUS
Somehow I don’t think your priorities and short list align with Jared and Ivanka’s...
Well, absolutely, but I hoped that fell under #1 on the list ;)
I have zero problem with Cruz on the Court, other than my above concern that his elbow-throwing style won’t work well in judicial conferences. (Hell, he was my candidate in the primaries until Trump sewed it up.) My concern with his nomination is political: I am guessing he would lose enough squish GOP Senators that he wouldn’t get confirmed.
There are currently 126 vacant federal judgeships that require filling. Since SCOTUS only hears about 1% of the cases brought before it, these lower court positions are just as important as SCOTUS for limiting legislating from the bench, and adhering to the strict and narrow interpretation of the Constitution.
I want to see a list of nominees put forth for these 126 positions ASAP.
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