Democratic Congressman James Clyburn of South Carolina says naming a Black woman like Judge Michelle Childs to the Supreme Court "says to every little child out there growing up in moderate circumstances … you've got just as much of a chance to benefit from the greatness of this country as everybody else."
South Carolina federal judge Michelle Childs is under consideration to succeed retiring Justice Stephen Breyer on the U.S. Supreme Court, the White House confirmed late Friday.
Childs, 55, is based in Columbia, South Carolina, and was nominated last year by President Biden to serve on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, often regarded as the second-most prominent federal court because of its proximity to the high court, the caliber of cases it considers and because so many of its judges have been elevated to the Supreme Court.
The Senate Judiciary Committee had been scheduled to hold a confirmation hearing for Childs's nomination next week, but aides confirmed Friday that her hearing would be postponed.
The White House explained late Friday the postponement is because Childs is under consideration to succeed Breyer.
"Judge Childs is among multiple individuals under consideration for the Supreme Court, and we are not going to move her nomination on the Court of Appeals while the President is considering her for this vacancy," White House spokesman Andrew Bates said in a statement.
Childs is among several contenders under consideration, including Ketanji Brown Jackson, also a judge on the D.C. appeals court, and Leondra Kruger, a justice on the California Supreme Court who once served in the Justice Department's Office of the Solicitor General.
White House Press Secretay Jen Psaki says Vice President Kamala Harris will have a “central role” in President Joe Biden’s search for a nominee to replace Justice Stephen Breyer on the Supreme Court.
During a press briefing on Thursday, Psaki said, “The vice president will play a central role in this process, and the president intends to consult with her very closely.”
“Obviously, she has a long history as a former attorney general, a member of the judiciary committee, and he respects her opinion greatly,” she added.
The Supreme Court on Monday agreed to hear a challenge to the consideration of race in college admissions. The court said it will take up lawsuits claiming that Harvard University, a private institution, and the University of North Carolina, a state school, discriminate against Asian American applicants. A decision against the schools could mean the end of affirmative action in college admissions.
The U.S. Supreme Court sided with Comcast in a high-stakes civil rights case Monday, ruling that media mogul Byron Allen must show race was the determining reason that the cable company refused to carry his channels in order for his discrimination case to survive.
In a unanimous decision, the Supreme Court ruled that a lower court used the wrong legal standard in allowing Allen’s $20 billion racial discrimination lawsuit to proceed. The Supreme Court sent the case back to the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in California for reconsideration.
Allen, an African American entertainment executive, says the Philadelphia cable giant racially discriminated against him when it refused to carry his cable-TV channels on its systems. Comcast says race had nothing to do with rejecting Allen’s channels, noting that they had low ratings.
The high court did not weigh the merits of Allen’s allegations. At issue was whether a person filing a racial-discrimination lawsuit must allege that race was the determining reason that a contract decision was made, or if a person can merely allege that race was one “motivating factor” for a case to proceed.
“To prevail, a plaintiff must initially plead and ultimately prove that, but for race, it would not have suffered the loss of a legally protected right,” Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote on behalf of the court, in an opinion released Monday morning.
Allen said he would continue his fight by asking Congress and presidential candidates to revise the statute in question to overcome the Supreme Court’s ruling.
“Unfortunately, the Supreme Court has rendered a ruling that is harmful to the civil rights of millions of Americans,” Allen said in a statement. “This is a very bad day for our country.”
Read the full article here: The Philadelphia Inqurier
If Ketanji Brown Jackson were nominated and confirmed to the U.S. Supreme Court, she would make history several times over. She'd be the court's first black female justice. Her confirmation would mean that for the first time four women would sit on the nine-member court. And it would mean two black justices would be sitting together for the first time.
Read more: Possible Supreme Court pick would make history in many ways
Black clergy from across the country are expressing outrage about the Republican-led Senate’s vow to block any nominee President Obama picks to fill a vacancy on the Supreme Court, saying it reflects racism and disrespect.
The National African American Clergy Network held the Friday conference call to express its outrage about the nomination process. On Feb. 22, coalition members issued a letter and video urging the GOP-controlled Senate to consider Obama’s nominee. They said they received no response.
The Rev. Barbara Williams-Skinner, the network’s co-chair, said the group is asking the Senate “to do nothing special for President Obama. Just do your job. Just do what the Constitution says and that is to hear the nominee and to vote on the nominee.”
The clergy leaders hope African-American voters will contact their senators and consider their treatment of the nomination process when they vote in upcoming primaries and the general election.
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Read more: Supreme Court divided on affirmative action
Representative Elijah E. Cummings (MD) made the following statement on his Facebook page about the Supreme Court ruling in Hobby Lobby Case.
(CNN)Michigan's law banning the use of affirmative action in college admissions was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court Tuesday, in a case that raised thorny questions over race and remedies.
The 6-2 ruling reversed a lower court's 2013 ruling that the voter-approved affirmative action ban violated the U.S. Constitution's equal protection guarantees. Three justices in the majority -- Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Anthony Kennedy and Samuel Alito -- concluded that the lower court did not have the authority to set aside the law.
It is the latest step in a legal and political battle over whether state colleges can use race and gender as factors in choosing which students to admit.
Read more: Michigan's affirmative action ban upheld by Supreme Court
