US President Joe Biden has appointed Kentanji Brown Jackson as the country’s new Supreme Court justice, the White House said Friday. If confirmed by the Senate, she will be the first black woman to hold the position since the court’s creation in 1789. The inauguration is scheduled for October.
In announcing the nomination, Biden said Jackson is known for her carefully made decisions and for considering how the laws will impact ordinary people. “That doesn’t mean she will be biased. She understands the broad impact of decisions, whether the cases deal with labor rights or government services. She cares about ensuring that democracy works for the American people,” the president said in a statement. ceremony at the White House, alongside nominee and vice president Kamala Harris.
Speaking after the nomination, Jackson, 51, thanked God and his family’s support for getting to this point. “When I was a kid, my dad decided to change careers, and he went from public school to law school. Some of my earliest memories are of him sitting at the kitchen table, reading law books. I saw him studying and he became my first professional example”, he said.
She also commented that she had an uncle sentenced to life in prison for drug trafficking, and that other family members made a career in the security forces: her brother was a police officer in Baltimore and later joined the Army, for which he was on missions in the Middle East. And two other uncles are police officers, one of whom was a police chief in Miami.
Jackson said he was inspired by Constance Motley (1921-2005), the first black woman to be appointed as a federal judge, in 1966. “I share with her a firm and courageous commitment to equality in justice before the law. If I am fortunate enough to be confirmed as the new Justice of the United States Supreme Court, I can only hope that my life, my career, my love for this country and the Constitution upon which this great nation was built, will inspire future generations of Americans.”
Jackson had already been appointed by Biden in June 2021 to the District of Columbia Court of Appeals. The nomination passed the Senate at the time by 53 to 44, with three votes from Republicans. Previously, she served on the District Court for the District of Columbia, to which she was appointed in 2013 by President Barack Obama. In office, she analyzed lawsuits involving presidential acts and blocked an attempt by then-President Donald Trump to expand the deportation of immigrants without hearing them at hearings and blocked three executive orders from him to limit the rights of federal workers, such as union membership. .
Jackson was also on the three-judge panel that gave the go-ahead for Congress to gain access to White House records relating to the January 6, 2021, invasion of the Capitol. The Supreme Court later upheld the decision.
Other of his decisions were favorable to the republican, such as the authorization of the exemption of the environmental impact study in the construction of the wall on the border with Mexico.
On reproductive rights issues, she ruled against an attempt by the Trump administration to cut funding for a teen pregnancy prevention program and, as an attorney, provided legal support to help maintain a Massachusetts state ban on anti-abortion activists embarrassing women in seeking medical attention.
She was born in Washington in 1970, the daughter of a lawyer and a school principal. Her parents attended segregated schools in the US South, where white and black students were supposed to go to different institutions. Afterwards, they studied at universities aimed at blacks and began their careers as teachers in the Miami public school system.
Jackson grew up in Miami, excelling in debate and oratory tournaments, and studied law at Harvard, where she was deputy editor of the Harvard Law Review. After graduating, she was an assistant to a few justices, including Stephen Breyer, 83, a member of the Supreme Court who announced he would retire at the end of the current legal year in October and paved the way for the new appointment.
In the 2000s, she alternated periods as a lawyer and public defender, in which she assisted people without money. If confirmed, Jackson will be the first former public defender to reach the Supreme Court.
In 2009, she was nominated by Obama for the vice presidency of the body responsible for defining the bases for federal sentences. During her tenure, the department recommended reducing penalties for crimes related to drug possession.
Jackson currently lives in Washington. She is married to Patrick, head of the division of general surgery at Georgetown University Hospital, with whom she has two daughters.
The US Supreme Court is the highest judicial body in the country, and has the power to decide the country’s course in sensitive areas. Currently, the court has six conservative-oriented magistrates and three who tend to vote more liberally. The new appointment will not change this picture.
One of the issues under consideration by the court is the right to abortion, which was released by a decision of the court itself, in 1973. In recent years, several American states have passed laws to restrict the practice, and when analyzing the legality of the procedures of one of them , the court may change its understanding of the matter. The dream of many conservatives is that a new ruling would overturn the 1973 ruling, paving the way for a ban on abortion.
Biden’s nomination will need to be approved by the Senate by a simple majority. Democrats now have 50 votes (out of a total of 100), plus Vice President Kamala Harris’s tiebreaker. The evaluation process should take around a month. That would leave time for the new nominee to be sworn in before the midterm elections, in which Democrats risk losing narrow majorities in the House and Senate.
The choice was seen as a nod from the president to the black electorate, who gave a good vote to Democrats in 2020, but who today have leaders criticizing him. In January, for example, the president went to Georgia to hold a rally advocating changes to facilitate access to the vote, but the event was boycotted by some black leaders, who called for more action and less speech.
The new judge will be only the third black person to be appointed to the Supreme Court in 232 years. The first was Thurgood Marshall, nominated by Democrat Lyndon Johnson in 1967 – he retired in 1991 and died in 1993. The second is Clarence Thomas, in office since 1991, when he was nominated by Republican George Bush.
Among women, the first to reach the post was Sandra O’Connor, in 1981, nominated by Republican President Ronald Reagan. Since then, another four have passed through the court. With the arrival of Jackson, the court will have nearly gender parity, with five men and four women, for the first time.
WHO IS WHO IN THE SUPREME COURT
conservative wing
John Roberts67
Nominated by George W. Bush in 2005. Although considered conservative, the current president of the Court sometimes acts in a moderate way
Clarence Thomas73
Nominated by George Bush Sr. in 1991
Samuel Alito71
Nominated by George W. Bush in 2006
Neil Gorsuch54
Nominated by Donald Trump in 2017
Brett Kavanaugh57
Nominated by Trump in 2018
Amy Coney Barrett50
Nominated by Trump in 2020
progressive wing
Stephen Breyer83 (retired in October)
Nominated by Bill Clinton in 1994
Sonia Sotomayor, 67
Nominated by Barack Obama in 2009
Elena Kagan, 61
Nominated by Obama in 2010​
