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Bond Becomes 7th Republican To Support Sotomayor; Senate Continues Debate On Judge
August 5, 2009 2:01 p.m. EST
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Kris Alingod - AHN Contributor
Washington, D.C. (AHN) - Sen. Kit Bond (R-MO), the ranking Republican on the Select Committee on Intelligence, on Wednesday said he will support Appeals Court Judge Sonia Sotomayor when the Senate holds a final vote on her nomination for the Supreme Court this week. The Senate began debate on the Obama administrtion's first high court nominee on Tuesday ahead of a month-long recess by Friday.
In a floor speech, the 70-year-old Bond invoked a time when "partisanship did not infect" voting on nominees, and decried the argument given by some Republican colleagues that they disagreed with Sotomayor's "judicial philosophy."
He joined six other Republicans who have said they will vote for Sotomayor, who is expected to be confirmed despite scant support from the GOP leadership.
"In my role as a Senator voting to fill that vessel, I have always looked to the Constitution to guide my obligation to give advice and consent.," Bond said. "It is an obligation separate and apart from my role as a legislator, when I vote for or against legislation before this body... If we were meant to do nothing more than cast a vote based on whether we agreed or disagreed with a nominee, where would we be then?"
"If some are saying that a Democratic President should not have a liberal Justice, does that mean a Republican President should not have conservative Justices?," he added. "That is not something I could support, for I surely supported judicially conservative Justices such as Roberts and Alito... But I have supported Justices with whom I disagreed on this philosophy. I supported these nominees of a Democratic president, as did 86 of my colleagues for Justice Breyer, and 95 of my colleagues for Justice Ginsberg. I hope those votes do not reflect a time that has slipped away, when partisanship did not infect every facet of our political life."
Sotomayor, 54, needs confirmation before she can sit when the Supreme Court reconvenes on Sept. 9, and begins its new term on Oct. 5. Democrats want her confirmed by the end of the week, before the congressional break.
With only 40 votes in the 100-member Senate and no Democrats saying they will oppose the judge, Republicans do not have the numbers to block her nomination. Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL), the top minority member in the Senate Judiciary Committee, has also pledged that they will not filibuster.
Only one member of the Republican leadership has supported her nomination.
Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN), chairman of the Senate Republican Conference, said last week he would vote to confirm the judge because "even though Judge Sotomayor's political and judicial philosophy may be different than mine... she is well qualified by experience, temperament, character and intellect." He also expressed hope that his vote would "help to return the Senate to the practice only recently lost of inquiring diligently into qualifications of a nominee and then accepting that elections have consequences."
Sen. Richard Lugar (R-IN), the most senior minority member in the Senate, was the first Republican to declare support for the judge. He was followed by Sens. Mel Martinez (R-FL), the Senate's only Hispanic Republican, Olympia Snowe (R-ME) and Susan Collins (R-ME).
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) last week joined the Judiciary Committee's 12 Democrats in voting 13-6 to endorse the nomination to the full Senate.
Sotomayor is set to become the Supreme Court's first Hispanic justice, an honor that Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) and Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX), chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee and a member of the Judiciary panel, have said could have belonged to Miguel Estrada if Democrats had not successfully filibustered his nomination in 2003 for the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and Senate Republican Policy Chairman John Thune (R-SD) have respectively cited President Barack Obama's "empathy standard" and "personal views in [Sotomayor's] decision making philosophy" in their decisions not to vote for the judge.
Senate Minority Whip Jon Kyl (R-AZ), a member of the Judiciary panel, has said, "Her attempt to re-characterize these speeches at the committee hearing strained credulity. I have not been persuaded that Judge Sotomayor is absolutely committed to setting aside her biases and impartially deciding cases based upon the rule of law. And I cannot ignore her unwillingness to answer Senators' questions straightforwardly."
Similarly, Sessions said she "attempt[ed] to re-brand her previously stated judicial approach."
Other Republicans who have said they will vote against the judge are: Sens. Thad Cochran (R-MS) and Orrin Hatch (R-UT). Sens. Tom Coburn (R-OK) and Chuck Grassley (R-IA), both members of the Judiciary panel, voted against the judge during the committee vote.
Hearings for the judge ended on June 16, dominated by questions about the judge's 2001 speech at the University of California, Berkeley that had the line, "I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often that not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life.
The proceedings also focused on her ruling in in Ricci v. Destefano, which was overturned by the Supreme Court last month in a 5-4 split decision. The judge has been criticized for ruling against white firefighters in New Haven who sued city officials for canceling promotions in 2003 because not enough blacks had passed the qualifying examinations.
Sotomayor, a Princeton and Yale Law School graduate, was confirmed in 1998 as an appeals court judge by a 67-29 Senate vote. If confirmed, she will replaces retired Justice David Souter as the third woman Supreme Court justice.
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