Leo: Different Republican Nominee, Same Democratic Dance; Sen. Hatch: Worried about Separation of Powers? Confirm Gorsuch
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- Leonard Leo, adviser to President Trump on the Supreme Court, writes in a piece for Real Clear Politics that Democrat posturing on the nomination of Judge Neil Gorsuch is entirely hypocritical.
Leonard Leo: Different Republican Nominee, Same Democratic Dance
“The fact is that Democrats are feigning concern both to discredit President Trump for reasons having nothing to do with the Supreme Court nomination, as well as for the same reason they’ve fought conservative appointees for 30 years: they don’t like judges who, like Judge Gorsuch, apply the law as it is written. It is demeaning for Democrats to use Judge Gorsuch as a pawn for discrediting President Trump’s policy positions as well as to scare people into thinking that Mr. Trump will be a lawless Executive. The phony and hypocritical invocation of principles that never mattered to them before is the real threat to judicial independence here.”
- Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT) writes at SCOTUSblog that anyone worried about the separation of powers should vote to confirm Judge Gorsuch to the Supreme Court.
Sen. Hatch: Worried about the separation of powers? Then confirm Judge Gorsuch
“Even a casual review of Judge Gorsuch’s opinions should eliminate any concerns my Senate colleagues may have concerning his commitment to the Constitution’s separation of powers. In his opinions, Judge Gorsuch has resisted executive branch efforts to make laws as opposed to merely enforcing those laws as written. Indeed, his opinions and other writings cogently make the case for this approach to separation of powers in a way that finds few rivals on the federal bench and reminds me much of the case Justice Scalia made during his time on the Court. Judge Gorsuch, moreover, has been a model of respect for the proper judicial role, a judicial philosophy under which ‘judges seek to interpret texts as reasonable affected parties might have done rather than rewrite texts to suit their own policy preferences.’”
- Michael McConnell, Professor of constitutional law at Stanford and former colleague of Judge Gorsuch on the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals, writes in The Hill that Judge Gorsuch “an independent thinker, never a party liner.”
Michael McConnell: I served with Judge Gorsuch. This is my reflection on his character.
“I served with Neil Gorsuch on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit for more three years, before I left the bench to teach constitutional law at Stanford University. I sat with him in about 50 cases. Sometimes we disagreed, strongly. More often, we agreed. I want to share my impressions of Judge Gorsuch because I assume that most Americans are fair-minded enough to evaluate him on the basis of his character, his ability, and his judicial temperament. In my opinion, based on my personal knowledge of Neil Gorsuch as a judge, the president could not have made a finer appointment… The best description of Gorsuch is that he is a constitutionalist rather than a partisan. In the years ahead of us, when a set of issues will arise that the country has never seen before, this is exactly the kind of justice Americans of all political stripes should hope for.”
