President Obama announces his Supreme Court nominee, Chief Judge Merrick Garland of the DC Circuit – UPDATED

March 16, 2016 JanF Editors' Choice, From the White House 19

President Obama announcing his nominee to the United States Supreme Court: in a Rose Garden address

Transcript: Remarks by the President Announcing Judge Merrick Garland as his Nominee to the Supreme Court

For Immediate Release March 16, 2016 Nomination Sent to the Senate

NOMINATION SENT TO THE SENATE:

Merrick B. Garland, of Maryland, to be an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, vice Antonin Scalia, deceased.

Earlier email from President Barack Obama:

Today, I will announce the person whom I believe is eminently qualified to sit on the Supreme Court.

As President, it is both my constitutional duty to nominate a Justice and one of the most important decisions that I — or any president — will make.

I’ve devoted a considerable amount of time and deliberation to this decision. I’ve consulted with legal experts and people across the political spectrum, both inside and outside government. And we’ve reached out to every member of the Senate, who each have a responsibility to do their job and take this nomination just as seriously.

Please join me in the Rose Garden at 11:00am Eastern for my announcement.

This is a responsibility I do not take lightly. In considering several candidates, I held each to three principles that reflect the role the Supreme Court plays in our democracy. […]

In putting forward a nominee today, I am fulfilling my constitutional duty. I’m doing my job. I hope that our Senators will do their jobs, and move quickly to consider my nominee. That is what the Constitution dictates, and that’s what the American people expect and deserve from their leaders.

President Barack Obama

Full text of the email below.

Follow the nomination process on Twitter at @SCOTUSnom.

Email from President Obama:

Today, I will announce the person whom I believe is eminently qualified to sit on the Supreme Court.

As President, it is both my constitutional duty to nominate a Justice and one of the most important decisions that I — or any president — will make.

I’ve devoted a considerable amount of time and deliberation to this decision. I’ve consulted with legal experts and people across the political spectrum, both inside and outside government. And we’ve reached out to every member of the Senate, who each have a responsibility to do their job and take this nomination just as seriously.

Please join me in the Rose Garden at 11:00am Eastern for my announcement.

This is a responsibility I do not take lightly. In considering several candidates, I held each to three principles that reflect the role the Supreme Court plays in our democracy.

First, a Justice should possess an independent mind, unimpeachable credentials, and an unquestionable mastery of law. There is no doubt this person will face complex legal questions, so it is imperative that he or she possess a rigorous intellect that will help provide clear answers.

Second, a Justice should recognize the limits of the judiciary’s role. With a commitment to impartial justice rather than any particular ideology, the next Supreme Court Justice will understand that the job is to interpret the law, not make law.

However, I know there will be cases before the Supreme Court in which the law is not clear. In those cases, a Justice’s analysis will necessarily be shaped by his or her own perspective, ethics, and judgment.

Therefore, the third quality I looked for in a judge is a keen understanding that justice is not about abstract legal theory, nor some footnote in a dusty casebook. It’s the kind of life experience earned outside the classroom and the courtroom; experience that suggests he or she views the law not only as an intellectual exercise, but also grasps the way it affects the daily reality of people’s lives in a big, complicated democracy, and in rapidly-changing times. In my view, that’s an essential element for arriving at just decisions and fair outcomes.

Today at 11:00am Eastern, I’ll introduce you to the judge I believe meets all three of these standards.

I’m confident you’ll share my conviction that this American is not only eminently qualified to be a Supreme Court Justice, but deserves a fair hearing, and an up-or-down vote.

In putting forward a nominee today, I am fulfilling my constitutional duty. I’m doing my job. I hope that our Senators will do their jobs, and move quickly to consider my nominee. That is what the Constitution dictates, and that’s what the American people expect and deserve from their leaders.

President Barack Obama

P.S. If you’re looking for the latest on my Supreme Court nominee and the confirmation process in the Senate, check out @SCOTUSnom on Twitter. You’ll find all the facts and up-to-date information there.

President Obama speaking about the vacancy on February 17th.

UPDATE – From the White House Press Office: Background on Judge Merrick Garland

19 Comments

  2. I’m sure it will be Sri Srinavasan, which in a way is good because he was confirmed 97-0 by the Senate last time around.

    In another way it’s bad, because we need more women on the Supreme Court.

    However, it’s unlikely that Srinavasan will be confirmed anyway, given the intransigence of the Rethugs, so he’s really in the nature of a sacrifice.

    • I actually think that Merrick Garland might be the pick. Here is my scenario:
      President Obama offers 63 year old Merrick Garland as the compromise pick, a guy who is probably not going to be on the court for 20 years, a reliable left-leaner and a guy who is willing to be a piñata. The Republicans embarrass themselves by refusing to even meet with him, his nomination diss becomes a campaign issue and Judge Garland is relieved because he wanted to retire at 65 and had his eye on a little fishing shack in Florida. THEN the new Democratic president is elected and nominates one of the picks for the next generation and he or she gets confirmed in 2017. :)

      I wanted Jane Kelly but she was savaged because she dared to have been a public defender, defending people who committed crimes!!! Sigh. I hope that Madame President nominates her.

      • That’s a good scenario, Jan! We shall see what transpires. Love the idea that the Judge has his eye on a little fishing shack in Florida. :)

  3. New York Times is reporting that it is Merrick Garland:

    BREAKING NEWS Wednesday, March 16, 2016 10:11 AM EDT

    President Obama will nominate Merrick Garland for the Supreme Court, officials say. He’s a centrist appeals court judge.

    President Obama on Wednesday will nominate Merrick B. Garland as the nation’s 113th justice, according to top Senate Democratic officials, choosing a centrist appeals court judge widely respected even by Republicans in hopes his choice will be considered by the Senate.

    • Here is Judge Garland’s Wikipedia entry. He is from Chicago and was raised Jewish:

      Judicial philosophy
      Considered an judicial moderate, Garland told senators during his U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee hearing in 1995 that the U.S. Supreme Court justice for whom he had the greatest admiration was Chief Justice John Marshall, and that he had personal affection for the justice for whom he clerked, Justice William Brennan.

    • HAHAHAHA!! President Obama is trolling Orrin Hatch:

      Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT), the longest serving Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, offered his own thoughts on who President Obama should nominate to fill the seat left open by the death of Justice Antonin Scalia last week. “[Obama] could easily name Merrick Garland, who is a fine man,” Hatch told the conservative news site Newsmax, before adding that “he probably won’t do that because this appointment is about the election. So I’m pretty sure he’ll name someone the [liberal Democratic base] wants.”

      • I’ve plunked a copy of your comment over in a few diaries at GOS (didn’t say it was your comment, just that I got it from Motley Moose). No responses but good to get the word out. Hope it goes viral.

  4. SCOTUSblog is doing a liveblog of the nomination announcement here.

    Lots of commentary about the what we could expect from a Justice Garland. People think he would be a centrist in the Kagan and Breyer mold but likely conservative on criminal issues.

    • From Tom Goldstein, SCOTUSblog, in 2010 when Merrick Garland was considered for a nomination:

      Judge Garland’s record demonstrates that he is essentially the model, neutral judge. He is acknowledged by all to be brilliant. His opinions avoid unnecessary, sweeping pronouncements.

  6. We’re paying these renegade Senators how much per year to do their jobs—is it $174,500? Many of us would be happy with one-fourth of that annual salary! These males are scum and deserve to be wiped away in the November erections—oh, pardon me, elections.

    • One of the Senators, Toomey of PA, said he would be willing to look at Judge Garland … as soon as he is nominated by a non-black president! Well, he didn’t quite put it that way but the subtext is apparent. The good news is that he is one of the endangered Senators and if he and his caucus refuse to do their job, he will be watching the next president nominate a liberal ideologue … from his living room couch.

      Take it or leave it. It will be interesting to see what they choose to do.

  7. ThinkProgress Climate’s take on Judge Garland:

    By and large, Garland has a reputation for allowing agencies to do the work they set out to do — and that’s usually a good thing for the environment.

    Albert Lin, a professor at UC Davis specializing in environmental and natural resources law, clerked for Garland at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit and said the judge was thorough and open-minded.

    “I don’t think he expressed a specific view towards the EPA, per se, but he recognized that government agencies have a role,” Lin told ThinkProgress. “They should have some discretion as to how they function — but he also wasn’t going to give them a free pass.” […]

    On the D.C. Circuit bench, which is responsible for hearing most administrative cases, such as the recent Clean Power Plan challenge, a third of Garland’s dissents have been over challenges to agency decision-making. In all of those dissents, Garland sided with the agency.

    And with a deadlocked Congress, further action on the environment is going to continue to come from executive actions intended to protect American’s air, water, and climate under existing frameworks, said Erich Pica, president of Friends of the Earth.

  9. The President sat for an interview with NPR and made a couple of points:

    “It is my belief that now more than ever his voice would serve the court well, would help to burnish the sense that the Supreme Court is above politics, and not just an extension of politics,” said Obama, adding that Garland has the kind of calm voice that would end up “increasing the American people’s confidence in our justice system.”

    He talked a bit about his vetting process and then got into the politics:

    In our interview, the president made clear he wants a hearing and a vote on the Garland nomination now, not after the election. He said he intends to take his argument to the American people, on the road and elsewhere, in the coming weeks, and he maintained that Republicans have now taken Senate prerogatives to the constitutional breaking point.

    “For the first time in anyone’s memory,” said Obama, “you have the head of the Senate saying, ‘I won’t meet with a nominee. I won’t provide a nominee a hearing. I will not provide a nominee a vote.'” […]

    “George Washington nominated a couple of Supreme Court justices in his last year,” Obama observed, noting puckishly that Washington “had better poll numbers, I’m sure, than I did.”

    “What’s particularly ironic,” added the president, is the number of Republicans who profess “respect for the Founders’ intentions” who are claiming that they would now “read into the Supreme Court nomination process” that a seat should remain vacant for “an entire year … because there’s an election going on.”

    Obama professed to be puzzled by Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell’s assertion that the Senate should let the American people decide, as part of the election, who gets to fill this Supreme Court seat.

    “In fact, the American people did decide, back in 2012 when they elected me president of the United States,” he said.

    Indeed. But you, sir, are a Democrat … and the McConnell Rules trump the constitution just as they have since January 2009.

  10. Al Franken in the Senate Judiciary hearing meeting yesterday:

    “Senator Al Franken is a former comedian and says he is well schooled on what is absurd. He finds the reasons from Republicans to block President Obama’s nomination of Merrick Garland are that – absurd. And then dismantles the GOP logic during Thursday’s Senate Judiciary Committee meeting.”

    • NY Times: The Supreme Court and the Extinction of the Serious Republican Senator

      One day, there’s going to be an exhibit at the Smithsonian dedicated to people like Senator Orrin Hatch, Republican of Utah. Schoolchildren will be told of days long, long ago when Republican senators thought of themselves as serious people, as statesmen and lawmakers.

      Say what you will about their politics, the teacher will explain, these people were protective of the Senate and of democracy. They participated in debates and votes on treaties, passed laws that made the government run and protected the most vulnerable Americans, and actually gave consideration to presidential nominees.

      The museum guides of the future will point to the spring of 2016 as the year when the serious Republican senator finally became extinct. […]

      On Wednesday, after Mr. Obama chose Judge Garland, Mr. Hatch said there would be no hearings now, or even a courtesy call, but he would “be open” to the idea of confirming the judge during a lame duck session after the election if a Democrat wins. If a Republican wins, then the Senate would go on refusing to do its Constitutional duty and would block Judge Garland until after Mr. Obama leaves office. […]

      The other senator from Utah, Mike Lee, joined Mr. Hatch in his lame argument that the Republicans had already done their duty because they decided not even to meet the nominee, never mind hold hearings, never mind have a vote. That, these days, is what Republican senators are trying to pawn off as advice and consent.

      But they are missing the small issue of the United States Constitution, which says the President “by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, Judges of the Supreme Court, and all other Officers of the United States.”

      The Senate. Not the Republican caucus.

  11. Liberal disappointment ignores President Obama’s stated aims of choosing the very best candidate based on his analysis. Here are a couple more pieces suggesting this wasn’t some sort of reverse-Souter, a pick who is Republican-lite.

    ThinkProgress: Merrick Garland Isn’t Especially Liberal. Here’s What That Means For How He’ll Decide Cases.

    Slate’s Mark Joseph Stern labeled Garland “an extraordinarily disappointing choice.” Political scientist Scott Lemieux warned that concerns over whether the Senate is being unfair to Garland “likely won’t galvanize any specific constituency.” Talking Points Memo’s Tierney Sneed offered that “President Obama’s choice of Merrick Garland to succeed justice Scalia on the Supreme Court was not the nominee progressives were dreaming of a month ago, when Scalia’s unexpected death opened up a once-in-a-generation opportunity to transform the Supreme Court.”

    In case there is any doubt, there’s little risk that Garland will become another member of the Court’s conservative bloc. University of Michigan law professor and former Ruth Bader Ginsburg clerk Sam Bagenstos predicted on Twitter that a Justice Garland would prove similar to Justice Stephen Breyer — an almost entirely reliable member of the Court’s liberal bloc with occasional bouts of heterodoxy. As Lemieux notes, Breyer “voted with Ruth Bader Ginsburg 93 percent of the time in the most recently completed term.” […]

    The swiftest victory for liberals if Judge Garland is confirmed is that he immediately halts the bleeding from lawsuits, such as the seemingly endless attacks on Obamacare, which seek to revive long dead conservative doctrines or selectively rewrite foundational rules of statutory interpretation. Even if Garland adopts Justice Anthony Kennedy’s current mantle as the Court’s “swing” justice, Garland is unlikely to swing so far that liberals will lie awake in terror, fearing that an historic legislative achievement will be gutted.

    WaMo: Why the Left is Wrong About Merrick Garland

    I still find it jarring that we’ve gotten to the point where Jewish-Americans can be characterized as “old white guys” as if they’ve been an accepted part of the political and social elite since the “discovery” of America. In truth, Garland’s grandparents fled the Pale of Settlement in the early 20th-Century. They weren’t on the registry of the Daughters of the Revolution. In fact, there isn’t a single white Anglo-Saxon protestant on the Supreme Court and there hasn’t been one since John Paul Stevens retired in 2010. That seems a little surprising considering that there are 150 million protestants in the country, and they still make up about 47% of the population. For most of our history, the Supreme Court has been made up entirely of protestants, almost all of them men. It was extremely important to get a broader representation of the country, including Jews, Catholics, women, and (under Obama) a Latina. I’d say, however, that it’s no longer remotely accurate to argue that the Supreme Court is the exclusive province of WASPs since there are no WASPs on the court. It’s even more inappropriate to characterize Merrick Garland as just one more non-diversity pick in the WASPy tradition of the Court. […]

    Some people think he’ll be to the right of the four pre-existing Democrat-nominated Justices, and some people think he’ll fit in to the left of Elana Kagan. He’s strong on environmental and labor issues, and more suspect on issues of criminal justice and privacy. Based on that, he’ll probably be strong on most, but not all, issues that progressives care about.

    It’s important not to see him as some sop to Republican intransigence. He’s perhaps the best credentialed judge in the country, a former clerk to Justice Brennan, a valedictorian at Harvard, and someone (as Nancy pointed out) who fits neatly into Obama’s preference for pragmatic consensus-building change.

    I know it’s tempting to build your email and donor lists by going for maximum outrage here, but this pick made sense. He’s a solid pick and it’s a solid political move, too.

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