WASHINGTON — Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell announced on Thursday he would vote against Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson, who is set to become the first Black woman ever to sit on the nation’s highest bench.
McConnell revealed his decision on the Senate floor following the conclusion of a week of Judiciary Committee hearings in which Jackson fielded pointed questions from Republican lawmakers on gender identity and sentences for child pornography.
“After studying the nominee’s record and watching her performance this week, I cannot and will not support Judge Jackson for a lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court,” McConnell said.
His reasoning stemmed from Jackson’s refusal to reject a plan to expand the Supreme Court, a plan supported by many Senate Democrats.
“I assumed this would be an easy softball for Judge Jackson, but it wasn’t,” McConnell said. “The nominee suggested there are two legitimate sides to the issue. She testified she has a view on the matter but would not share it.”
During questions about adding additional justices to the existing nine-member Supreme Court, Jackson said such speculation goes beyond “the proper role of a judge.”
But McConnell said Jackson tipped her hand when she said she’d be thrilled to be “one of however many” justices to serve on the Supreme Court.
“The most radical pro-court-packing fringe groups badly wanted this nominee for this vacancy — Judge Jackson was the court-packers' pick and she testified like it,” he said.
Additionally, McConnell indicated that the lack of a long paper trail to evaluate Jackson gave him pause.
He cited that while Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett had written hundreds of lower court opinions when they were nominated, Jackson had only published two in the year she has been on Washington’s circuit court.
“If the nominee had a paper trail on constitutional issues, perhaps it could reassure us. But she doesn’t,” McConnell said.
McConnell was always likely to end up a “no” vote on President Joe Biden’s first selection to the Supreme Court. Earlier this week as the hearings proceeded, he called her answers “evasive and unclear.”
But his announcement is a clear indication that Jackson is unlikely to win many Republican votes.
She won’t need any if all 50 Democrats hold together. Vice President Kamala Harris can break a tie.
The last Supreme Court nominee, Coney Barrett, was confirmed 52-48.
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