Just a few hours after Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson was confirmed to sit on the Supreme Court, conservative Carrie Severino, of the discredited Judicial Crisis Network, got a friendly platform to smear Judge Jackson.
Severino suggested that Jackson had hidden something sinister by refusing to answer Republicans’ “serious questions.” She claimed Jackson “didn’t answer a lot of questions thoroughly, she said she didn’t know about a lot of things, she just simply didn’t want to go on the record saying things, and she was largely given a pass by that. I think there was a calculation, and that she knew she could kind of say, ‘Oh, I don’t have a judicial philosophy,’ and give kind of vague answers.”
Next, Severino suggested Jackson is some kind of Trojan Horse for liberal dark money groups. Jackson “has major support from the big, heavy-hitter dark-money groups on the left that have funded upwards of a billion dollars for Democrat campaigns, they’re going to support the nominee put forward by this group,” Severino said.
Host Neil Cavuto didn’t question a word. He didn’t even ask Severino which dark money groups are doing the funding.
And despite the disrespect and the racist and sexist smears Jackson suffered during her confirmation hearing, Severino made conservatives the victims: “The ones who get the really difficult nomination processes unfortunately are always the Republican nominees,” Severino claimed. “You think of the Clarence Thomases of the world [she’s a former clerk for Thomas], Brett Kavanaugh, or even, as I said Amy Coney Barrett, outstanding nominee and still couldn’t even get a single Democrat to vote for her. Justice Gorsuch, who they tried to filibuster, Justice Alito also they tried to filibuster.”
Never mind that both Thomas and Kavanaugh were credibly and multiply accused of sexual harassment and sexual assault, respectively. Cavuto certainly didn’t mention it. Which is pretty relevant given the Republican’s bad-faith obsession with Judge Jackson’s sentencing of pedophiles.
Severino went on to accuse Democrats of using “brass knuckles” against Republicans. Yet, all the judges Severino whined about getting the “brass knuckles” treatment were confirmed.
Then came this Severino whopper that was not challenged: “I’m glad to say we had serious questions, serious questions about her judicial philosophy that at least the Republicans took seriously, if not the Democrats and most of the mainstream media.”
The fact that Severino was treated as a serious guest at all speaks volumes about Fox’s bad faith “analysis,” especially regarding claims of dark money.
From Media Matters:
The Judicial Crisis Network is a widely discredited right-wing judicial advocacy organization founded in 2005 that supports the confirmation of conservative judges and has repeatedly lobbed dishonest attacks against Democratic judicial and executive nominees in an attempt to derail their confirmations. The dark money group has also served as a messaging enforcer in service of Republican nominees, most notably former President Donald Trump’s three Supreme Court justices. As recent reporting has confirmed, it is an integral part of the well-funded conservative activist ecosystem that has dedicated itself to packing the federal judiciary with extremist right-wing reactionaries.
On February 3, JCN launched a $2.5 million ad buy claiming that whomever Biden nominates to fill Justice Stephen Breyer’s Supreme Court seat would be a “huge payback” to a philanthropic consulting firm for a “record amount of dark money spent” by progressive groups to help elect Biden and Senate Democrats. JCN’s original ad baselessly claimed that Biden and the Senate were bankrolled by these social impact advisers, which was revised after the firm sent defamation letters to stations airing the ad pointing out that it “has not donated to any political campaigns — and, as a corporation, is legally barred from doing so.” Judicial Crisis Network President Carrie Severino has nevertheless relentlessly pushed the wild claim on Twitter, and turned it against Judge Jackson on the morning of February 25.
Media Matters further notes that Severino’s smear was picked up and amplified by the RNC, Sen. Mitch McConnell and Glenn Beck. This afternoon, Fox News gave her more than four minutes of unchallenged air time as a "chaser" to Judge Ketanji Jackson Brown's historic confirmation.
You can watch it below, from the April 7, 2022 Your World.
Clarence Thomas was and is an unsuitable candidate to be named to any federal bench, let alone the SC. He was hand-picked as a slap in the face to Thurgood Marshall and to everyone who appreciated the perspective Marshall brought to the high court. His bias and extreme partisanship has never waned one iota in the 30+ years he has inflicted opinions at the SC. In addition to his vicious partisanship, he has demonstrated the qualities of a truly despicable man, just as was indicated by Anita Hill as well as multiple other women who were not permitted to testify. And he’s currently mired in a conflict of interest that in any reasonable society would require him to step down in disgrace and potentially face criminal prosecution.
Samuel Alito was and is an unsuitable candidate for any federal bench, let alone the SC. He was nominated as a Far Far Right replacement for Sandra Day O’Connor, to tip the SC even more solidly to the Right than it had already been up to that point. He’s also an open racist, having enthusiastically joined and supported the Concerned Alumni of Princeton. (The only way angry Right Wingers could dodge this fact at his hearing was to have his wife burst into tears and stomp out of the room in a tantrum when it was brought up.) His bias and extreme partisanship has never waned one iota in the 16 years he has inflicted opinions at the SC.
Neil Gorsuch was and is an unsuitable candidate for any federal bench, let alone the SC. He was rammed into a seat stolen by angry Right Wingers from Merrick Garland, specifically with the intent of making sure this seat was not filled by President Obama or by anyone remotely less Far Right Wing than Scalia. When Trump unexpectedly squeaked through the 2016 Election, angry Right Wingers got a double victory – they got to sneer in the face of everyone else, and they were able to change Senate rules and ram through an extreme partisan idealogue even farther to the Far Right than Scalia.
Brett Kavanaugh was and is an unsuitable candidate for any federal bench, let alone the SC. His consistent basis has been that of a privileged wealthy Right Winger, going back to his days in prep school, where he and his buddies were known for heavy drinking and for openly inappropriate conduct with women. His record as a partisan has been openly craven, and his financial matters have been more than shady. And all of this was discussed at both of his confirmations, where he was effectively rammed through by angry Right Wingers to make sure he got his judicial rewards. He committed perjury in both of his confirmations, but the standard of proof for a criminal case is so high that he was able to get away with it. And he got away with openly vicious outbursts in his SC hearing (just as Lindsey Graham did), rather than being compelled to retreat in disgrace.
Amy Coney Barrett was and is an unsuitable candidate for any federal bench, let alone the SC. She frankly should have stayed at Notre Dame, where she could have opined against reproductive freedom all the livelong day without endangering women’s lives as the upcoming Dobbs ruling is certain to do. Her appointment and ramming onto the SC were a deliberate slap in the face to Ruth Bader Ginsburg and all who supported her.
All five of the judges discussed above should have been rejected, but were instead given lifetime berths to follow the Far Right’s long game of destroying and erasing the precedents in civil rights and workers’ rights that were established under the Warren Court and some moments of the Burger Court. Severino is paid to shill for a Far Right advocacy group that is bent on that destruction and erasure.
If there’s a god involved in all this, he’s an evil son of a bitch.