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Speaker 1: Donald Trump and his aid say he's narrowed down his

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Speaker 1: universe of potential Supreme Court nominees to a handful, perhaps

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Speaker 1: three or four or five. That's down from the twenty

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Speaker 1: one people he listed during the presidential campaign. A person

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Speaker 1: who's close to the process described Trump's criteria for Bloomberg

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Speaker 1: someone who has a long and distinguished conservative track record,

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Speaker 1: but ideally is no older than fifty eight. Mr Trump

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Speaker 1: is said to be willing to go outside what has

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Speaker 1: been the traditional box for Supreme Court nominees and consider

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Speaker 1: someone without an Ivy League pedigree, and possibly even a

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Speaker 1: state court judge. The announcement is likely only a few

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Speaker 1: weeks away, and I'm told could happen even before inauguration

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Speaker 1: day on September twenty excuse me, January. We're gonna talk

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Speaker 1: about those criterias, criteria and what it could mean for

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Speaker 1: Trump's Supreme Court announcement. Who will be the next Supreme

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Speaker 1: Court nominee. Our guest today is Stephen Vladik, a professor

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Speaker 1: at the University of Texas Law School. Steve, Thanks for

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Speaker 1: joining us, Steve. One name that keeps being mentioned is

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Speaker 1: that of William Pryor. He's a judge in atlant and

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Speaker 1: excuse me, in in Alabama. He's on the Atlanta based

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Speaker 1: Federal Appeals Court there. Donald Trump has mentioned his name.

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Speaker 1: He's fifty four, so he's right in the middle of

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Speaker 1: the the age range. Is it your sense that he

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Speaker 1: is the front runner and f so what kind of

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Speaker 1: Supreme Court justice would he be? Yeah? I mean, you know,

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Speaker 1: the two names credit that I keep here on the

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Speaker 1: most often are Judge Prior and also Judge Diane Psyche,

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Speaker 1: who I imagine we'll talk about in the minute, who

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Speaker 1: sits on the Seventh Circuit, the Federal Appeals Court in Chicago,

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Speaker 1: though chief keeps her chambers in Wisconsin. UM, you know,

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Speaker 1: with the guard to Judge Prior, I mean, I do

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Speaker 1: think that he meets almost all of the criteria that

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Speaker 1: have been offered by the Trump transition team. UM President

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Speaker 1: George W. Bush actually recess appointed him to the Eleventh

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Speaker 1: Circuit back in two thousand and four because he was

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Speaker 1: so controversial at the time. UM he was part of

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Speaker 1: the deal that was made between the so called Gang

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Speaker 1: of Fourteen that allowed his nomination to get to a

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Speaker 1: full Senate vote in two thousand five, where he was

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Speaker 1: confirmed very narrowly fifty three to forty five. Um. You know,

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Speaker 1: he's a former Attorney General of Alabama, UM, which I

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Speaker 1: think should tell folks quite a bit about his credentials. Um.

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Speaker 1: He's called Roe versus Wade. You know, the Supreme Court

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Speaker 1: decision recognizing a woman's right to an abortion, Um, the

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Speaker 1: worst abomination in the history of constitutional law. So I think,

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Speaker 1: you know, Judge Pryor is very much red meat um

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Speaker 1: for conservatives looking for, you know, someone to carry on

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Speaker 1: the legacy and the and the voting record of of

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Speaker 1: the late Justice antonin Scalia. We're talking about Donald Trump's

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Speaker 1: Supreme Court nomination. Our guests are University of Texas law

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Speaker 1: professor Steven Blantock and Carry Sabina of the Judicial Crisis Network.

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Speaker 1: Kerry Steve was talking a moment ago about Judge William Pryor. Um,

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Speaker 1: given all that's happened with this this nomination, would wouldn't

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Speaker 1: judge prior sort of being in your face kind of

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Speaker 1: kind of statement by this new administration towards the Democrats.

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Speaker 1: Surely he would be incredibly uh controversial and stir up

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Speaker 1: a lot of opposition. Well, frankly, anyone on Trump's list

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Speaker 1: is going to be controversial and stir up opposition because

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Speaker 1: they are all people who are going to be consistent

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Speaker 1: judicial conservatives. They're going to be people who have justice

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Speaker 1: scalias approach of originalism to the Constitution. And uh, and

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Speaker 1: I don't think that's something that that the liberals are

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Speaker 1: going to want to see on the court. Now. Prior

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Speaker 1: has some more explicit statements anythink we we talked about

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Speaker 1: his statement about Roe versus Wade earlier, but frankly, that's

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Speaker 1: that is presumably the position of everyone on this list.

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Speaker 1: And Frankly, the idea that roversus Wade is constitutionally unfirm

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Speaker 1: is something that is shared across the spectrum. You've got

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Speaker 1: people like Lawrence Tribe, who is a leading liberal constitutional

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Speaker 1: law professor, who says there is no substantive reasoning behind

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Speaker 1: this opinion, even though I think he agrees with um

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Speaker 1: the the end of it. So I think people are

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Speaker 1: people are trying to try to drum that up into

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Speaker 1: more than it is. But while he may have more

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Speaker 1: on the record than some people do, I think you'll

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Speaker 1: see that across the board. We're going to look at

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Speaker 1: people on this list who are going to be originalists

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Speaker 1: and text list when it comes to the Constitution, and

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Speaker 1: that means sticking with the Constitution rather than trying to

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Speaker 1: read into it um other kind of policy goals like

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Speaker 1: the Court did in ro versus. Wade. Steve is carry

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Speaker 1: right in the sense that that everybody on Donald Trump's

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Speaker 1: list is going to be pretty similar. Let's I mean,

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Speaker 1: let me ask you about Diane Sykes, for example, Uh,

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Speaker 1: somebody else you mentioned, somebody else Donald Trump has mentioned.

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Speaker 1: Is she going to be as conservative as as William

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Speaker 1: Prior would be, only with perhaps a bit of a

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Speaker 1: softer demeanor maybe. I mean, I guess you know, the

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Speaker 1: I resist the notion that that everyone on the list

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Speaker 1: is the same. I mean, I think that there are

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Speaker 1: there are subtle but important differences in all these folks.

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Speaker 1: And also, I mean, let's keep in mind that there's

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Speaker 1: a long history of lower court judges, you know, moving

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Speaker 1: one direction or the other once they put on the

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Speaker 1: Supreme Court. So I'm not sure that we should assume

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Speaker 1: that all of these folks are equal just because perhaps

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Speaker 1: they all share the view that Row is wrong. We decided, um,

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Speaker 1: you know, some almost what's different about her from um

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Speaker 1: a judge prior? Um. This is something with state court experience,

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Speaker 1: I mean, she's spent um the better part of thirteen

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Speaker 1: years on the Wisconsin state courts, first on the lower

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Speaker 1: courts and then on the Wisconsin Supreme Court. Um, you know,

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Speaker 1: this is someone who obviously from a different part of

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Speaker 1: the country, and so may you know, come with some

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Speaker 1: of these issues from that perspective as opposed to, you know,

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Speaker 1: the perspective of a state attorney general from Alabama. Um.

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Speaker 1: So you know, I guess i'd just be careful to

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Speaker 1: to not paint all these folks with the same brush,

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Speaker 1: just because in the broader scheme of things, they might

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Speaker 1: all be, you know, properly cast with the label conservative.

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Speaker 1: Carry Diane Sex just turned fifty nine. Is is she

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Speaker 1: too old to be a Supreme Court nominee? I don't

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Speaker 1: think anyone this list is necessarily too old. And remember,

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Speaker 1: of course women's women's lifespans are exceed those of men,

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Speaker 1: so you can subtract a few years right from her

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Speaker 1: age if you're comparing her to the guys in the list. Um,

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Speaker 1: I don't think so. I think all these people are

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Speaker 1: going to be incredibly qualified. Obviously, you want someone who's

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Speaker 1: gonna be on the court for a long time. But hey, look,

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Speaker 1: at Justice. She's in her eighties, she's still serving on

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Speaker 1: the court. So I think thirty twenty or thirty years

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Speaker 1: in the court is a really long tenure, however you

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Speaker 1: slice it. Carry, Um, who else should we be talking

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Speaker 1: about here? One thing that I've been told is that, uh,

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Speaker 1: somebody with a compelling personal story might have a little

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Speaker 1: bit of an edge. Is or is there somebody on

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Speaker 1: this list who has an especially good personal story you

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Speaker 1: think might might play well and add something to the court.

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Speaker 1: You know, there's there's a lot of great, great personal

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Speaker 1: stories in there. The one that first jumps to mind

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Speaker 1: when you talk about personal stories as Judge Grunder. He

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Speaker 1: has um a really you know, challenging background where he

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Speaker 1: had survived an attack on a domestic violence attack on

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Speaker 1: his family by his own father, um, and was injured

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Speaker 1: in the process. And it was really amazing to see

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Speaker 1: what he has overcome then to accomplish all the incredible

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Speaker 1: things he did. I think that's that's a really amazing

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Speaker 1: story and by all accounts, you know, a really great

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Speaker 1: guy as well. So, um, yeah, there's certainly and I'm

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Speaker 1: not saying everyone on this list is is identical. Obviously,

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Speaker 1: they all have slightly different you know, um backgrounds, You've

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Speaker 1: got You've got people who are state judges in this list,

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Speaker 1: which I think is so interesting. It's not just the

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Speaker 1: typical list of all federal polic court judges. You've got

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Speaker 1: federal district court judges, You've got state, um Supreme Court

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Speaker 1: justices on there, so that those all those people bring

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Speaker 1: a slightly different type of experience, and I think that's

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Speaker 1: it's going to be interesting to see how the President

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Speaker 1: weighs those different things, um, when he's deciding to do that. Steve,

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Speaker 1: I've only got about well twenty seconds left or so,

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Speaker 1: is there somebody on this list you recognizing you don't

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Speaker 1: don't agree with Mr Trump on a lot of things,

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Speaker 1: somebody you would you would pick out as being in

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Speaker 1: especially good choice for him. I mean, you know, I'm

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Speaker 1: a big fan of going against the grade here, and

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Speaker 1: so someone like Senator Mike Lee from Utah, who has

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Speaker 1: been very vocal in the opposition to President Trump and

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Speaker 1: who has you know, meaningful federal political experience. Some of

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Speaker 1: the great justice in American history were senators first, and

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Speaker 1: it would be nice to you know, get that kind

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Speaker 1: of cross branch dialogue back on the court. We're gonna

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Speaker 1: have to leave it there. Steve Lattick carry Savorino. Thank

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Speaker 1: you so much. Coming up on Bloomberg, we will talk

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Speaker 1: about police taking pictures of your draft, of your license plate.

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Speaker 1: This is bloomber