U.S. Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kan., announced Friday he would oppose the nomination of Ketanji Brown Jackson to the U.S. Supreme Court, even as it appears she will have the needed support to be confirmed.
In a statement, Marshall said he had listened to two days of confirmation hearings and conducted “a thorough and thoughtful review of her qualifications and judicial record” before coming to the conclusion that he “cannot support her confirmation.”
He pointed specifically to past handling of criminal cases as a jurist and argued Jackson doesn’t have the experience to be a justice on the nation’s highest court. Jackson been a federal jurist in 2013 but has sat on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia for one year.
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“I believe she will rubberstamp Biden’s far-left agenda instead of protecting the Constitution and our Kansas values,” Marshall said. “There is no way I can in good faith support her to be an Associate Justice on the U.S. Supreme Court.”
A simple majority of 51 of the 100 senators must vote yes for Jackson to be confirmed. The Senate is evenly split between 50 Democratic caucus members and 50 Republican members, and Vice President Kamala Harris would break tie votes, giving Democrats the majority.
No Republicans have announced their support for Jackson yet and some already have indicated they’ll oppose her.
Speaking on the Senate floor Thursday, GOP Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said that “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 our highest Court.”
McConnell’s opposition is not surprising, and likely presages the stance of the vast majority of the GOP caucus.
In sometimes acrimonious grilling during the confirmation hearings this week, Republicans pressed the judge on her record sentencing defendants in child porn cases, her views of court packing and as a federal public defender representing detainees at Guantanamo Bay. She was probed on other topics including critical race theory, court packing and gender.
Some Republican moderates, notably Maine Sen. Susan Collins or Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski, could decide to support Jackson. They both voted yes on her appointment to her current role, as did South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, whose aggressive questioning and visible dissatisfaction with some of her answers in this week’s hearings suggests he won’t vote to support her again.
Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia said Friday that he intends to vote yes on Jackson’s nomination, effectively guaranteeing she will be confirmed.
Andrew Bahl is a senior statehouse reporter for the Topeka Capital-Journal. He can be reached at abahl@gannett.com or by phone at 443-979-6100.