As a presidential candidate, Joe Biden made various efforts to distance himself from his long and unseemly record as an inveterate drug warrior and law enforcement booster. Alas, Biden is now reportedly considering replacing Justice Stephen Breyer with a South Carolina judge who has her own regrettable record of judicial deference toward the government in criminal justice cases.
That judge is J. Michelle Childs. She was appointed to the U.S. District Court for the District of South Carolina in 2010 by President Barack Obama. In terms of politics, she is well-connected to Democratic Party power brokers. As The New York Times has reported, Rep. James Clyburn (D–S.C.), whose endorsement is widely credited with helping Biden to win the South Carolina primary, has been lobbying Biden directly to name her to SCOTUS. "It is a blatant effort to call in a political favor in the form of a lifetime appointment to the nation's highest court," noted Times reporter Annie Karni, "and, perhaps, the most consequential test yet of the Biden-Clyburn relationship."
