We do not yet know her name, but one thing is certain: the next candidate for the Supreme Court will be a black woman. Joe Biden promised it. This is a big first. In 232 years, out of 115 judges, there are only 5 female members and 3 from minorities. “When Joe Biden announced this during his campaign, it was, in a sense, a political promise, but at this moment in our history, this declaration has a very significant significance,” said Margaret Russell, professor of law at the santa clara university.
In addition to the desire to diversify the high court, Joe Biden hopes to raise his popularity rating with the African-American electorate. According to an NBC poll, it has dropped to 64%, nearly 20 points lower than nine months ago. Blacks resent him for failing to reform the police or pass a law protecting the right to vote. And Covid and inflation are hitting them hard. As a result, African Americans, the mainstay of the party, are likely to shun the polls in November, a potential disaster for Biden.
Tight schedule
There is therefore an urgent need to appoint the replacement for Stephen Breyer, the Democratic judge who announced his retirement. Especially since there is always the threat that a senator will fall ill or, worse, die, which would complicate the confirmation of the nomination for Congress, given the very thin majority of Democrats. The schedule is also tight. If they regain control of the Senate in the midterm elections, Republicans will do everything to block the nominations.
The White House obviously has a list of candidates with an impeccable CV. The favorite is Ketanji Brown Jackson, 51, recently promoted to the highly influential District of Columbia Court of Appeals. This mother has held various positions, including that of court-appointed lawyer, a function quite rare among aspirants to the high court, and was already on President Obama’s list. Leondra Kruger, 45, a California Supreme Court justice, is also in the running. The daughter of a Jamaican mother and a white father, she knows the inner workings of the Court very well, as she was the assistant general counsel under Obama and pleaded more than ten times before the Elders.
Annoyed conservatives
But, in recent days, much has been said about J. Michelle Childs, 55, a member of a federal court in South Carolina and awaiting an appeals court seat. She is pushed by Jim Clyburn, a black representative from South Carolina to whom Joe Biden owes a lot. It was he who mobilized African-American voters and thus enabled Biden to win in his state and, in the process, to win the Democratic nomination.
J. Michelle Childs has another merit. She was educated at the University of South Carolina, not the elite faculties of Yale or Harvard like her rivals and 8 of the 9 Sages in place. And her confirmation process could be made easier by the fact that she has the support of her state’s two Republican senators.
Racial discrimination
Some conservatives have not hesitated to accuse Joe Biden of racial discrimination, since he refuses to consider a non-Black. It’s “insulting”, it’s like saying he doesn’t care about the rest of the population, claimed Ted Cruz, the Texas senator. Biden puts “skin color above qualifications”, added an editorial in the wall street journal. However, he is not the first to favor race or gender. Ronald Reagan promised to appoint a woman, George HW Bush wanted a diversity candidate…
The Republicans do not seem – for the moment – eager to bring out the heavy artillery. They know that overly aggressive attacks risk “backfiring, mobilizing Democrats and scaring away undecided voters,” said Cook Political Report analyst Amy Walter. Above all, “the presence of a new judge will not make a difference in the decisions of the Court, which is dominated by conservatives”, concludes Margaret Russell. She replaces a Democrat, so the ideological balance remains unchanged. The White House is expected to announce its choice at the end of the month.