GORSUCH SKATES WHILE STILL A MYSTERY ON MAJOR ISSUES | 3 Key Hearings at SCOTUS Next Week
March 14, 2017
SKATING BY
|POLITICO’s Sueng Min Kim and Burgess Everett report that while Democrats are paralyzed, unsure of how to oppose DONALD TRUMP’S nominee, NEIL GORSUCH skates. “Democrats can’t seem to land a punch on Neil Gorsuch — and it’s not even clear they want to.” 70 senate meetings later and just a week away from his confirmation hearing, it’s looking like Gorsuch will have an easy breezy time getting to SCOTUS.
THE OLE ONE-TWO PUNCH
|But Jordain Carney for The Hill writes that Democrats are doing their best to start taking shots at the nominee and paint him as a close affiliate of the Trump administration ahead of his hearings. “Will he allow the court to become a full-fledge promoter of pro-corporate, anti-consumer, anti-worker, anti-small-business, anti-middle class agenda for decades?” This being the question underlining the Democratic message of opposition from Winnie Stachelberg of the Center for American Progress.
NOT SO FAST
|There is also a broad coalition of abortion-rights groups that is strongly opposing NEIL GORSUCH. More than 50 groups have signed onto a letter meant to pressure Senate Dems into blocking the nominee. It reads: “We implore senators to do everything necessary to block this nomination.”
WILD THING, YOU MAKE MY HEART SING
|SCOTUS nominee, JUDGE GORSUCH, has much in the way of mystery. More than a month since his nomination and he’s still a wild card on a variety of pressing issues that are expected to come before the high court in coming years.
IMMIGRATION
|“If NEIL GORSUCH wins confirmation to the Supreme Court, he could cast the deciding vote on PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP’S travel ban against immigrants from certain countries. But it’s far from certain how he would vote. According to an Associated Press review of Gorsuch’s rulings, he has not written extensively about immigration policy during a decade on the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. And the few rulings he has been involved in do not reveal how he might decide if given the opportunity to consider an immigration ban.”
CRIMINAL JUSTICE
|Sam Hanalel with The Associated Press reports that JUDGE GORSUCH may be “hard to pigeonhole on criminal justice issues if he is confirmed to the Supreme Court.”
THE SHOW GOES ON
|And while the Senate Judiciary committee grills JUDGE GORSUCH in the biggest interview of his life, the Supreme Court will go about its business across the street. The staff over at Constitution Daily covers three key cases that the court will hear during Gorsuch’s hearing week.
SCOTUS REVIEWS
Gorsuch's Adherence to Originalism Should Keep him from SCOTUS
The National Law Journal“Originalism fails to adapt to changing times and makes promises it cannot keep.”
OTHER NEWS
Lawyers Plan a White House Legal Attack on Federal Agency Power
TIME“White House counsel Don McGahn has assembled a team of elite lawyers with the stated goal of leading Trump Administration efforts to roll back regulatory powers across the U.S. government.”
A New Phase of Chaos on Transgender Rights
The New Yorker“Questions about what constitutes sex discrimination against transgender people will be alive long after we have answers on bathroom access.”