WEBVTT - Victory for Longtime Immigrants at Supreme Court 0:00:03.200 --> 0:00:07.960 This is Bloomberg Law with June Brussel from Bloomberg Radio. 0:00:09.520 --> 0:00:12.280 In a six or three decision with an unusual alignment 0:00:12.280 --> 0:00:15.319 of justices, the Supreme Court hand did a victory to 0:00:15.480 --> 0:00:19.079 longtime illegal immigrants this week with a ruling that turned 0:00:19.120 --> 0:00:22.079 on a single word, the smallest word in the English 0:00:22.120 --> 0:00:25.440 language of that what does the word A mean in 0:00:25.480 --> 0:00:29.280 the term a notice to appear? Justice Neil Gorsts wrote 0:00:29.280 --> 0:00:33.360 the majority opinion and had telegraphed in oral arguments that 0:00:33.440 --> 0:00:37.000 it means one notice. I would have thought the government 0:00:37.080 --> 0:00:40.279 might have taken the hint from an ah Justice majority 0:00:40.280 --> 0:00:45.160 in per a notice of appeal means what it seems 0:00:45.200 --> 0:00:47.960 to me. Let me ask you this, what if what 0:00:48.000 --> 0:00:49.320 if I had a law clerk and I said, in 0:00:49.360 --> 0:00:51.880 my manu, my law cart manual, I want to bench 0:00:51.960 --> 0:00:56.080 memoranimentalize in the facts law in your proposed disposition, and 0:00:56.200 --> 0:01:00.520 instead of providing that my lawhart provided three step meadows, 0:01:00.920 --> 0:01:04.240 each sailing various views of the facts or more on 0:01:04.280 --> 0:01:06.720 the law. And then I don't know a couple on 0:01:07.160 --> 0:01:10.959 proposed disposition, so that the bench memorandum, the answer Justice 0:01:11.040 --> 0:01:14.480 course which was looking for, was no. Those nine separate 0:01:14.520 --> 0:01:18.200 memos would not be a bench memorandum joining me is 0:01:18.280 --> 0:01:20.679 Leon Fresco, a partner at Holland and Knight and the 0:01:20.760 --> 0:01:23.360 former head of the Office of Immigration Litigation at the 0:01:23.440 --> 0:01:27.480 Justice Department. Leon tell us how the notice to appear 0:01:27.920 --> 0:01:33.600 figures into the process for deportation proceedings. Whenever the government 0:01:33.840 --> 0:01:38.119 wants to play someone into removal proceeedings, it begins by 0:01:38.160 --> 0:01:40.520 giving them a piece of paper, and that piece of 0:01:40.560 --> 0:01:43.880 paper is called the notice to appear. That's the form 0:01:44.040 --> 0:01:47.160 that looks the same every single time. You can Google 0:01:47.200 --> 0:01:50.600 it and see it online. And that notice to appear 0:01:51.320 --> 0:01:53.600 is supposed to have a date and time and location 0:01:53.720 --> 0:01:56.920 and there's actually little black bomb the form wherein you 0:01:57.040 --> 0:01:59.880 fill out the date and time and location of the area. 0:02:00.360 --> 0:02:03.880 So in this case, the notice, like an honestly hundreds 0:02:03.880 --> 0:02:07.800 of thousands of other cases, did not have that date 0:02:08.000 --> 0:02:12.239 and time and location where to appear at the immigration 0:02:12.320 --> 0:02:16.320 court hearing because what often happens in these cases is 0:02:16.400 --> 0:02:19.840 when the government apprehends someone, especially in the southern border, 0:02:20.320 --> 0:02:24.240 it doesn't have time to figure out where the hearing 0:02:24.360 --> 0:02:26.880 is going to be at what they've designed to be at, 0:02:27.200 --> 0:02:29.840 so it just places to be announced. C B A 0:02:30.600 --> 0:02:34.200 on the notice to appear, and then you're supposed to 0:02:34.240 --> 0:02:38.640 get some notice later that tells you, Okay, you moved 0:02:38.639 --> 0:02:41.320 to Los Angeles or you moved to New York. Here 0:02:41.560 --> 0:02:44.240 is when you're hearing is going to be And so 0:02:44.440 --> 0:02:48.720 that's what's been usually happening, but that practice was challenged 0:02:48.760 --> 0:02:53.040 in this case. So in this case, Augusta Nisha Vez, 0:02:53.440 --> 0:02:56.440 a Guatemalan immigrant who came to the US illegally in 0:02:56.480 --> 0:03:00.160 two thousand five, received his first notice to appear at 0:03:00.200 --> 0:03:03.720 a deportation here in eight years later. Explain why the 0:03:03.800 --> 0:03:08.280 timing is so important here, Well, so here is the issue. 0:03:08.360 --> 0:03:11.000 So this is about a very small sliver of cases, 0:03:11.560 --> 0:03:15.800 which are called cancelation of removal cases. And in order 0:03:15.880 --> 0:03:19.720 to be eligible for cancelation of removal, you have to 0:03:19.840 --> 0:03:22.600 be someone who's been in the United States for ten 0:03:22.919 --> 0:03:28.799 years before you were placed into removal proceedings. And during 0:03:28.800 --> 0:03:32.520 those ten years you have to have basically had a 0:03:32.639 --> 0:03:37.120 qualifying relative that now is the reason why your removal 0:03:37.160 --> 0:03:39.960 should be canceled. So you've given birth to a US 0:03:40.040 --> 0:03:45.160 citizen or you married a US citizen, and in those situations, 0:03:45.240 --> 0:03:49.320 if you can prove that your removal will cause extreme 0:03:49.480 --> 0:03:53.560 and unusual hardship, but usually because that that relative has 0:03:53.640 --> 0:03:57.000 some major medical issue or something like that, and if 0:03:57.000 --> 0:03:59.760 you were to leave, they would have totally someone not 0:04:00.040 --> 0:04:03.040 able to defend their interests and so they probably die. 0:04:03.120 --> 0:04:06.440 If you left, you could get this relief called cancelation 0:04:06.480 --> 0:04:10.040 of removal. And so the question in this case is, well, 0:04:10.040 --> 0:04:13.320 how do you prove that you have been in the 0:04:13.400 --> 0:04:18.000 United States for ten years before your removal proceedings started? 0:04:18.560 --> 0:04:21.480 And so for people who never were even placed at 0:04:21.520 --> 0:04:25.400 the removal proceedings for ten years, that's easy enough. But 0:04:25.640 --> 0:04:29.080 for someone who got a notice that didn't tell them 0:04:29.120 --> 0:04:32.200 what the date and time of the hearing? One could 0:04:32.720 --> 0:04:36.760 that notice then stop the clock so to seek meaning 0:04:37.160 --> 0:04:40.520 you were properly placed in removal proceedings before you had 0:04:40.640 --> 0:04:44.120 established that you lived in the United States for ten years, 0:04:44.800 --> 0:04:47.239 and what the court rook is. The answer that question 0:04:47.320 --> 0:04:50.240 is no. The only way to stop the clock is 0:04:50.279 --> 0:04:53.800 to serve that document, the notice to appear in the 0:04:53.880 --> 0:04:56.799 proper way, filling in all the blames with the data 0:04:56.800 --> 0:04:59.560 and time and location of the hearing. And the focus 0:04:59.560 --> 0:05:03.120 in the decision was on the article A in the 0:05:03.160 --> 0:05:09.440 phrase a notice to appear correct meaning the question was 0:05:10.200 --> 0:05:14.680 in this case, did the ten year period that needed 0:05:14.720 --> 0:05:18.400 to take place before you were placed at removal proceedings 0:05:18.720 --> 0:05:22.640 stop the first time you were given any notice, even 0:05:22.640 --> 0:05:25.240 if it wasn't a complete notice, or did it need 0:05:25.320 --> 0:05:28.200 to be a complete notice to appear with everything that's 0:05:28.240 --> 0:05:32.520 required in the notice to appear? And what Justice Gorson 0:05:32.680 --> 0:05:37.160 said is because it said a quote notice to appear, 0:05:37.560 --> 0:05:40.280 that means has to be in one document, one notice 0:05:40.320 --> 0:05:43.280 to appear that has all of the items to it. 0:05:43.279 --> 0:05:46.000 It could be that you got this one document, a 0:05:46.080 --> 0:05:49.920 notice to appear, and that document says TB A to 0:05:50.080 --> 0:05:52.640 be abound, and then you get another piece of paper 0:05:52.720 --> 0:05:55.960 later that's not the form called the notice to appear 0:05:56.360 --> 0:05:59.000 that tells you, hey, you're hearing is on October fourth 0:06:00.040 --> 0:06:02.880 one at the Houston Court House. That's not gonna work. 0:06:03.200 --> 0:06:07.320 You actually have to get the document from notice to appear. 0:06:07.480 --> 0:06:10.960 That's why it says a quote notice to appear. And 0:06:11.120 --> 0:06:13.920 only if you get that document with everything in it 0:06:14.000 --> 0:06:17.120 that is required by law, have you been properly placed 0:06:17.120 --> 0:06:21.200 into removal proceedings such that's at that moment we stopped 0:06:21.200 --> 0:06:23.520 counting whether you've been in the US for ten years 0:06:23.640 --> 0:06:27.880 or not justice. Course, such wrote that the dispute may 0:06:28.000 --> 0:06:32.040 seem semantic since the gentlystices are basing the decision on 0:06:32.160 --> 0:06:36.479 the meaning of one word, isn't it semantic? Well, it's 0:06:36.520 --> 0:06:41.159 semantic in terms of how you define an article in 0:06:41.200 --> 0:06:44.800 a statute. But in real life, this is now going 0:06:44.839 --> 0:06:49.119 to mean hundreds of thousands of individuals who have US 0:06:49.200 --> 0:06:54.000 citizen children or got married, but they can't change their 0:06:54.040 --> 0:06:56.600 status because people think when you get married, you can 0:06:56.680 --> 0:06:59.040 change your status. But that's only true of you overstayed 0:06:59.080 --> 0:07:02.600 the visa, not true if you entered illegally by crossing 0:07:02.640 --> 0:07:05.680 the border. So for all the people who entered illegally 0:07:05.720 --> 0:07:08.520 by crossing the border and got married to a US citizen, 0:07:08.960 --> 0:07:10.800 or for all of the people who have had U 0:07:10.880 --> 0:07:14.760 s citizens children since they acquired illegal status in the 0:07:14.800 --> 0:07:18.720 United States, for any of those people, they can now 0:07:18.880 --> 0:07:23.920 move to reopen their case and apply for cancelation of removal, 0:07:24.080 --> 0:07:27.560 and that will actually have two different benefits. One, they 0:07:27.640 --> 0:07:31.760 might actually get cancelation of removal, although that's unlikely because 0:07:31.760 --> 0:07:34.200 there's an annual cap of four thousand and there's a 0:07:34.240 --> 0:07:37.440 huge line already, so it's unlikely that that will happen. 0:07:37.480 --> 0:07:40.960 But what's more likely to happen is that by reopening 0:07:41.000 --> 0:07:46.480 their removal proceeding, they will no longer have a removal 0:07:46.640 --> 0:07:49.840 order against them, which means they're back to normal. And 0:07:49.920 --> 0:07:53.440 so what could then happen, especially for the people whose 0:07:53.520 --> 0:07:57.880 children will have turned twenty one maybe during the Biden administration, 0:07:58.560 --> 0:08:02.640 is that once goes to older in one, they can 0:08:02.680 --> 0:08:05.320 apply for green cards for their parents and the parrots 0:08:05.360 --> 0:08:09.240 doesn't have a removal order against them. So this is 0:08:09.280 --> 0:08:13.680 actually potentially going to lead to the regularization of the 0:08:13.760 --> 0:08:17.520 status of at least a few thousand people and maybe 0:08:17.600 --> 0:08:21.080 tens of thousands of people. Let's talk about the lineup 0:08:21.400 --> 0:08:24.520 justice course which wrote the majority opinion. The majority also 0:08:24.600 --> 0:08:29.920 included Justices Clarence Thomas, Stephen Bryer, Sonya Sotomayor, Elena Kaig 0:08:30.000 --> 0:08:33.200 and Amy Coney Barrett. The descent was written by Justice 0:08:33.200 --> 0:08:37.760 Brett Kavanaugh, joined by Chief Justice John Roberts and Samuel Alito. 0:08:38.360 --> 0:08:42.120 How do you account for those alliances? I think if 0:08:42.160 --> 0:08:45.880 you're a textual is there's no way you could have 0:08:46.080 --> 0:08:49.960 ruled gets what the ruling was in this case. It 0:08:50.080 --> 0:08:53.559 literally says a notice to appear, and it says in 0:08:53.679 --> 0:08:55.840 the stattoo what the notice to appear has to had. 0:08:56.559 --> 0:09:00.800 The problem is, if you're sort of a practical policy person, 0:09:00.920 --> 0:09:04.280 you might say, well, my lord, this point beheaded sort 0:09:04.320 --> 0:09:07.520 of conclusion is going to drive us to a point 0:09:07.520 --> 0:09:09.760 where what is the government's supposed to do. There's no 0:09:09.800 --> 0:09:12.400 way it can know when the hearing is going to 0:09:12.480 --> 0:09:15.280 be when it first apprehends people, and so this is 0:09:15.320 --> 0:09:18.360 not practical, and so we can't interp for laws in 0:09:18.360 --> 0:09:22.800 a way that are not practicable to enforce. But that's 0:09:23.280 --> 0:09:28.880 not what the Congress intended. The Congress intended that you 0:09:28.960 --> 0:09:32.800 get a notice to appear, and that notice that tells 0:09:32.840 --> 0:09:36.520 you where to appear and when is what triggers your 0:09:36.520 --> 0:09:39.840 removal proceeding. And so what's the court said is, even 0:09:39.880 --> 0:09:43.040 if you think this is not practical, if it's reasonable 0:09:43.160 --> 0:09:46.400 enough to think why Congress would have wanted you to 0:09:46.480 --> 0:09:49.360 get that in one notice and not in several notices, 0:09:49.679 --> 0:09:52.679 because if you lose one of the several notices, then 0:09:52.720 --> 0:09:54.920 you still don't know when you're hearing. Is so that's 0:09:54.920 --> 0:09:58.120 a practical enough reason why you could say, converse asked 0:09:58.160 --> 0:10:01.200 for one notice, the case is over. That's it. We 0:10:01.280 --> 0:10:04.040 don't get into these discussions of well does one make 0:10:04.160 --> 0:10:08.480 more sense then the other? The statute clearly reads one notice, 0:10:08.920 --> 0:10:11.560 and there's a reason why Congress might have all wanted 0:10:11.559 --> 0:10:13.880 this to be in one notice. So that's the end 0:10:13.920 --> 0:10:16.440 of the analysis. So let me ask you about the 0:10:16.480 --> 0:10:22.199 Descent also used textualism, but came to a different decision 0:10:22.240 --> 0:10:26.880 on how to understand the article A right. The Descent 0:10:27.200 --> 0:10:30.840 was basically making an argument about that there was no 0:10:30.920 --> 0:10:35.160 practical way to interpret the statute in the way that 0:10:35.240 --> 0:10:37.960 the people who were challenging this we're saying. They first 0:10:38.000 --> 0:10:41.760 of all, they really were upset that the argument chosen 0:10:41.920 --> 0:10:44.440 by the majority opinion was not even one that was 0:10:44.559 --> 0:10:49.040 briefed about this issue of A the letter A meaning singular. 0:10:49.679 --> 0:10:52.040 They claimed that wasn't even really briefed in the case. 0:10:52.120 --> 0:10:55.560 This was a decision that Justice Gorsage appeared to just 0:10:55.679 --> 0:10:58.280 come up with on his own and then was able 0:10:58.360 --> 0:11:01.080 to rally his five other leagues around getting it. So 0:11:01.120 --> 0:11:05.160 that was their first criticism of the decision. But moving forward, 0:11:05.480 --> 0:11:08.360 what they were really trying to get at is that 0:11:09.120 --> 0:11:12.840 the A doesn't necessarily being a singular. If you say 0:11:12.880 --> 0:11:17.000 a manu spirit, a manu sprit comes over courses of time, 0:11:17.520 --> 0:11:19.360 and so that could be the same thing as the 0:11:19.440 --> 0:11:22.000 notice to appear, So that there's no reason the aid 0:11:22.160 --> 0:11:28.160 necessarily required a singular notice. And so because it's not 0:11:28.320 --> 0:11:31.720 practical to expect the government at the border to know 0:11:31.800 --> 0:11:34.960 when and where everybody's hearing was gonna be, why should 0:11:35.000 --> 0:11:37.280 they have to know that in order to start the 0:11:37.320 --> 0:11:40.520 removal proceeding? Why should a person get the benefits of 0:11:40.559 --> 0:11:44.239 these proceedings if the government never served the right documents 0:11:44.480 --> 0:11:47.720 to which Justice course had said, Well, because that's the 0:11:47.760 --> 0:11:50.719 way of the bureaucracy works. People all the time are 0:11:50.800 --> 0:11:53.000 punished for not filling out the right forms of the 0:11:53.080 --> 0:11:55.680 right way. So if the government doesn't fill out the 0:11:55.760 --> 0:11:57.800 right forms in the right way, it should have the 0:11:57.840 --> 0:12:00.680 same punishments that people get what they don't of the 0:12:00.760 --> 0:12:04.080 right forms in the right way. So what does it 0:12:04.160 --> 0:12:08.120 tell you that textualism was used to justify both the 0:12:08.240 --> 0:12:12.880 majority and the dissent. There are textualists on both sides 0:12:12.920 --> 0:12:16.560 of these arguments, and no matter what ethos or governing 0:12:16.600 --> 0:12:19.520 principle you use, you'll always be able to get to 0:12:19.559 --> 0:12:21.920 a different outcome. But at the end of the day, 0:12:21.960 --> 0:12:24.959 the reason you have the amalgamation of justices that you 0:12:25.040 --> 0:12:27.640 have in this case is because you have both the 0:12:27.720 --> 0:12:32.960 practical and the fairness arguments and the literal interpretation of 0:12:33.000 --> 0:12:36.480 the statute argument merged into the same results, which is 0:12:36.480 --> 0:12:40.439 the compassionate results of this case. And that's rarely the case, 0:12:40.520 --> 0:12:42.880 but when it happens, that's why you get a six 0:12:43.000 --> 0:12:45.760 or three ruling here. So what happens to the guatemal 0:12:45.800 --> 0:12:49.760 And immigrant in this case now? So now this person 0:12:49.840 --> 0:12:53.880 can actually reopen their proceedings and try to make the 0:12:54.000 --> 0:12:58.559 argument that their deportation would harm a U s it 0:12:58.720 --> 0:13:02.120 is a child because it would lead to extreme an 0:13:02.160 --> 0:13:04.880 unusual hardship to that U s it is in child. 0:13:04.960 --> 0:13:08.200 The question will be will they be early enough in 0:13:08.280 --> 0:13:10.000 the cap to be able to get one of the 0:13:10.040 --> 0:13:12.600 four thousand green cards available each year where they have 0:13:12.720 --> 0:13:16.320 to wait several years, or will they be able to 0:13:16.360 --> 0:13:19.600 get a green card from their child eventually when the 0:13:19.679 --> 0:13:23.880 child turns one, so long as the court and basically 0:13:23.920 --> 0:13:27.000 the Biden administration is willing to hold the proceedings in 0:13:27.040 --> 0:13:30.200 a bay in until the child turns one, or even 0:13:30.360 --> 0:13:34.200 administratively closed the proceeding, which you can imagine the Biden 0:13:34.240 --> 0:13:38.360 administration doing in many cases. Moving forward, Thanks Leon, that's 0:13:38.440 --> 0:13:42.239 Leon Fresco of Hollanden Night. Coming up next, the justices 0:13:42.320 --> 0:13:47.760 will confront the confrontation clause. This is Bloomberg the first 0:13:47.760 --> 0:13:51.679 Senate here and for President Joe Biden's judicial nominations seemed 0:13:51.720 --> 0:13:55.320 to go fairly smoothly. The committee heard from five nominees, 0:13:55.360 --> 0:13:59.040 with Judge Katangi Brown Jackson attracting most of the attention. 0:13:59.400 --> 0:14:02.880 Joining me is Madison Alder, Bloomberg Law reporter. When did 0:14:02.880 --> 0:14:08.080 the White House begin vetting judicial nominees? So we learned 0:14:08.120 --> 0:14:11.640 from the documents that the nominees who were at the 0:14:11.640 --> 0:14:16.600 most recent Senate Judiciary Committing hearing submitted that the White 0:14:16.640 --> 0:14:21.120 House started vetting nominees pretty early on um Katondi Brown Jackson, 0:14:21.240 --> 0:14:24.960 who is Biden's pick for the DC Circuit and it's 0:14:25.000 --> 0:14:28.200 kind of thought of as a favorite for potential Supreme 0:14:28.240 --> 0:14:32.160 Court vacancy, was contacted by the White House on January 0:14:32.520 --> 0:14:35.280 which is six days after Biden was not gary that 0:14:35.960 --> 0:14:39.840 we also have, uh, you know, Candice Jackson Akiblumy, who 0:14:39.920 --> 0:14:42.520 was one of the nominees that the hearing, the Senate 0:14:42.600 --> 0:14:46.240 Judiciary Committee hearing on Wednesday. She was contacted by the 0:14:46.320 --> 0:14:50.880 White House on January eleven and asked about, you know, 0:14:50.960 --> 0:14:53.880 the potential vacancy the following day. So the White House 0:14:53.960 --> 0:14:56.800 is really getting started quite early on this, um, you know, 0:14:57.000 --> 0:15:02.400 compared to previous administrations. Um. The Trump administration got started 0:15:02.480 --> 0:15:05.680 fairly early as well with their first Lower Court nominee 0:15:05.680 --> 0:15:08.480 in most of heart Um, you know, so did Obama. 0:15:08.600 --> 0:15:11.400 He reached out to his first appeal of Court nominee 0:15:11.560 --> 0:15:15.720 in January. Biden, as we all know, I had eleven 0:15:15.720 --> 0:15:18.640 nominees in his first list, so it was kind of 0:15:18.680 --> 0:15:21.840 a larger group of people in that first group that 0:15:21.880 --> 0:15:25.920 they were looking at. Explain that how the nomination process works. 0:15:26.200 --> 0:15:29.440 Take us through it because some people think that, you know, 0:15:29.600 --> 0:15:32.600 Biden just looks at the lists and decides who he wants. 0:15:32.840 --> 0:15:35.960 But it's more complicated than that. So it is more 0:15:35.960 --> 0:15:41.240 complicated than that. Um. The Biden administration works with senators 0:15:41.280 --> 0:15:45.120 to um look at nominees for their states, especially in 0:15:45.200 --> 0:15:48.760 the district court level. And blue slip is is how 0:15:48.880 --> 0:15:51.720 senators will indicate their support for nominee. It's natural blue 0:15:51.760 --> 0:15:55.080 slip of paper in which they indicate their support. That 0:15:55.280 --> 0:15:57.400 is no longer in place for the fields court nominee 0:15:57.480 --> 0:16:01.200 as the Republicans did away with that during the Trump administration. UM, 0:16:01.240 --> 0:16:02.920 but they still have to work with senators for for 0:16:03.000 --> 0:16:06.960 district court picks and the buying administrations, you know, trying 0:16:06.960 --> 0:16:09.120 to work with with Democrats right now in the Senate, 0:16:09.240 --> 0:16:12.440 there's a few vacancies and in red states and purple 0:16:12.480 --> 0:16:15.240 states as well, so that's that's a big part of 0:16:15.240 --> 0:16:19.360 the process. And White House Council dainagrenas on the certain 0:16:19.400 --> 0:16:24.080 transition as senators of Democratic senators to make sure that 0:16:24.120 --> 0:16:28.280 they are affording names quickly, and asked senators to send 0:16:28.360 --> 0:16:32.720 names for already vacant seats by January nineteenth, the day 0:16:32.720 --> 0:16:37.600 before inauguration, and for any vacancies after that within forty 0:16:37.640 --> 0:16:41.680 five days of you know, vacancies. So they're basically asking 0:16:41.720 --> 0:16:44.320 for people to speed up this process, to get quicker, 0:16:44.720 --> 0:16:47.680 UM with this process, so that on their end they 0:16:47.720 --> 0:16:51.320 can you know, do do things um expeditiously as well. 0:16:51.320 --> 0:16:53.440 And on the White House end, you know, they're they're 0:16:53.440 --> 0:16:56.440 getting the candidates, they're doing background checks on them, they're 0:16:56.480 --> 0:16:59.720 interviewing them. Um. Their process, from what I've heard, is 0:16:59.720 --> 0:17:03.160 a lot of paperwork. So UM, that also takes quite 0:17:03.160 --> 0:17:07.440 some time before they can actually formally nominate people. So 0:17:07.800 --> 0:17:12.840 why is the Biden administration seemingly in this rush to 0:17:12.960 --> 0:17:16.560 get nominees? They have four years in office? What is 0:17:16.560 --> 0:17:20.680 the rush? So part of the rush is that, Um, 0:17:21.000 --> 0:17:24.920 the Senate majority is very slim. Uh. You know, Democrats 0:17:24.960 --> 0:17:30.080 have the fifty fifty split right now, very very slim margin. Um, 0:17:30.160 --> 0:17:32.480 the slimness of margins for the majority of the Senate, 0:17:33.080 --> 0:17:37.359 and mid terms often don't turn out well for for 0:17:37.400 --> 0:17:40.639 the party in the White House. So what they're worried about, 0:17:40.760 --> 0:17:45.159 or you know, what could happen, um, is that the 0:17:45.200 --> 0:17:49.480 Senate could change hands and getting judicial nominees advanced would 0:17:49.520 --> 0:17:52.680 become that much harder. If you have a Republican majority 0:17:52.680 --> 0:17:56.840 in the Senate, they could easily block any of Biden's 0:17:56.880 --> 0:18:01.560 judicial picks. That happened with President brockle Vama. His judicial 0:18:01.600 --> 0:18:05.200 nominees did not move forward when Republicans were in control 0:18:05.240 --> 0:18:08.280 of the Senate. So I think that's the large part 0:18:08.320 --> 0:18:10.680 of why the administration would like to move quickly here. 0:18:11.080 --> 0:18:14.440 So you mentioned the early deadlines that the Biden administration 0:18:14.560 --> 0:18:18.560 set for the senators. Did all the senators make those deadlines. 0:18:19.400 --> 0:18:21.680 My colleague and I, Courtney Rosen, who are a White 0:18:21.680 --> 0:18:24.320 House reporter, we took a look at at this and 0:18:24.760 --> 0:18:28.320 spoke to the Senate offices and the commissions that they 0:18:28.320 --> 0:18:30.760 set up to help them that picks before they can 0:18:30.760 --> 0:18:33.720 send him over the White House. We spoke to as 0:18:33.720 --> 0:18:36.120 many people as we could about how they were meeting 0:18:36.200 --> 0:18:39.639 those and found that some states were having difficulty meeting 0:18:39.640 --> 0:18:43.000 these deadlines. At least six states are having difficulty. A 0:18:43.200 --> 0:18:46.440 few states wouldn't tell us if they met the deadlines 0:18:46.520 --> 0:18:48.280 or not, and then there's they're also is a handful 0:18:48.280 --> 0:18:50.280 of states that have met these deadlines, and you know 0:18:50.320 --> 0:18:52.920 a few of those were on the president's first list 0:18:53.000 --> 0:18:56.680 of of nominees. But the reasons why some people aren't 0:18:56.720 --> 0:18:59.679 meeting these deadlines is because the lot of the January 0:18:59.720 --> 0:19:03.280 mis app during the transition also included some other really 0:19:03.400 --> 0:19:06.840 key elements the Biden administration is looking for in judicial nominees, 0:19:07.080 --> 0:19:12.320 like diversity of experienced, racial and ethnic diversity. They're really 0:19:12.320 --> 0:19:15.879 looking for candidates who aren't currently represented on the federal courts, 0:19:16.119 --> 0:19:19.400 and that is challenging for some Senate offices to those 0:19:19.400 --> 0:19:22.159 for nominees who don't fit the mold of not me 0:19:22.320 --> 0:19:24.600 they for in the past. They're looking for new people. 0:19:25.160 --> 0:19:27.919 And you know, we learned in one state in Massachusetts, 0:19:28.359 --> 0:19:30.600 Nancy Gartner, who's a former federal judge who chairs the 0:19:30.600 --> 0:19:33.320 commission there, told us that they couldn't meet the January 0:19:33.359 --> 0:19:36.080 nightte deadline specifically because they were looking for a more 0:19:36.600 --> 0:19:39.080 diverse pool. Some of the other reasons include, you know, 0:19:39.200 --> 0:19:42.800 getting a lot of of applications for for judicial nominations. 0:19:42.840 --> 0:19:46.800 In California, they've received over three hundred judicial applications. They 0:19:46.800 --> 0:19:49.840 have eighteen vacancies in the state at least right now, 0:19:50.640 --> 0:19:55.639 so they have a massive undertaking um But Senators are 0:19:56.000 --> 0:19:58.280 told us that they're working as as quickly as the 0:19:58.320 --> 0:20:00.280 possibly can, and the White House also told us that 0:20:00.320 --> 0:20:04.760 they understand that Senators are working on this and and 0:20:04.760 --> 0:20:07.359 and that it does take time to find these nominees. 0:20:07.840 --> 0:20:11.639 At the first hearings, the focus was on Judge Katangi 0:20:11.720 --> 0:20:16.200 Brown Jackson. Tell us about her. So, Katangi Brown Jackson 0:20:16.560 --> 0:20:19.960 is a judge on the District of DC currently. She 0:20:20.040 --> 0:20:22.879 has public defense experience, and she was one of the 0:20:22.920 --> 0:20:26.000 nominees who was at this first Senate Judiciary Committee hearing. 0:20:26.520 --> 0:20:29.440 She's being talked about as a potential nominee for the 0:20:29.600 --> 0:20:33.040 Supreme Court. There's an vacancy yet, but she's one of 0:20:33.080 --> 0:20:36.040 the people that people think Biden would be likely to nominate. 0:20:36.680 --> 0:20:40.000 She's nominated to Merritt Garland's seat on the DC Circuit, 0:20:40.040 --> 0:20:41.919 and the d C Circuit is seen as it's kind 0:20:41.920 --> 0:20:46.240 of a springboard for Supreme Court nominees. It's considered the 0:20:46.240 --> 0:20:49.000 second highest court in the land. So if she's named 0:20:49.040 --> 0:20:53.080 there and liberals are I'm Justice Bryers and maybe stepped down, 0:20:53.400 --> 0:20:55.920 it would be a quick turnaround if she were nominated 0:20:55.960 --> 0:20:58.560 that seat. But maybe getting a little ahead of ourselves. 0:20:58.960 --> 0:21:02.840 So there was a lot of reculation by conservative activists 0:21:02.840 --> 0:21:07.280 that Republicans might give Jackson a hard time with tough 0:21:07.400 --> 0:21:10.840 questions about her record as a judge and reversals by 0:21:10.840 --> 0:21:14.160 the court she's nominated to sit on. So how did 0:21:14.200 --> 0:21:18.639 it go? So in large part, Republicans did ask tough 0:21:18.720 --> 0:21:22.760 questions and they, you know, try to pin the nominees 0:21:22.840 --> 0:21:26.639 down on how they felt about judicial activism, how they 0:21:26.680 --> 0:21:30.959 felt about controversial matters of law, but they received relatively 0:21:31.119 --> 0:21:35.920 little pushback. There was one offense where Senator Tom Tillis 0:21:35.960 --> 0:21:39.320 pulled up a clip from NSNBC talking about one of 0:21:39.359 --> 0:21:43.040 Katanji Brown Jackson's decisions. Thing was written for a broad audience, 0:21:43.119 --> 0:21:45.359 kind of seeming to make the link Katani Brown Jackson 0:21:45.440 --> 0:21:49.840 potentially auditioning for the Supreme Court. But that was really 0:21:49.880 --> 0:21:53.280 the only instance where we had something that was, you know, 0:21:53.359 --> 0:21:58.159 a little bit more of aggressive exchange between the senators 0:21:58.240 --> 0:22:03.040 and phenomenes. Is the opinion that he was referring to 0:22:03.359 --> 0:22:06.399 the one It evolved from a White House counsel Don McGann, 0:22:06.400 --> 0:22:10.520 and she said, presidents aren't King's. That was the decision 0:22:10.640 --> 0:22:13.280 he was referring to. And I should note also in 0:22:13.280 --> 0:22:16.280 the hearing, Senator Mike Lee of Utah as the Republicans 0:22:16.440 --> 0:22:19.840 also mentioned that same phrasing and that he's said that 0:22:19.960 --> 0:22:22.960 in the past before. All four of the nominees at 0:22:22.960 --> 0:22:26.440 the hearing are people of color. Were there any questions 0:22:26.440 --> 0:22:31.639 involving race? There was, So she and her fellow Circuit 0:22:31.680 --> 0:22:34.480 Court nominee who's nominated to the seventh Circuit were both 0:22:34.520 --> 0:22:37.640 asked how their race they're both black, how their race 0:22:37.680 --> 0:22:40.560 would impact their decision making, if at all, by Senator 0:22:40.640 --> 0:22:43.200 John Cornan of Texas, who is a Republican he was 0:22:43.280 --> 0:22:45.520 making the link that Democrats were making, you know, a 0:22:45.720 --> 0:22:48.840 huge deal lot of svertifying the courts, and both of 0:22:48.880 --> 0:22:51.360 them said that their race would not make an impact 0:22:51.440 --> 0:22:55.600 on their decision making. As I mentioned before the hearing, 0:22:55.680 --> 0:23:00.399 a lot of conservative activists were pointing to this visions 0:23:00.440 --> 0:23:04.200 that Jackson has made that have been reversed on appeal. 0:23:04.240 --> 0:23:08.880 And Carrie Severino, who's the president of the Conservative Judicial 0:23:08.920 --> 0:23:11.639 Crisis Network, told you that she's someone who was a 0:23:11.640 --> 0:23:15.000 record of being regularly overturned by the d C Circuit. 0:23:15.440 --> 0:23:18.520 What is her record as far as reversals and did 0:23:18.560 --> 0:23:22.680 the Republicans question her about her record? The Republicans really 0:23:22.760 --> 0:23:27.240 didn't question her about this reversal record, um, even though 0:23:27.240 --> 0:23:30.199 this is something that I heard beforehand would potentially be 0:23:30.320 --> 0:23:33.920 something that they would ask her about her record. She 0:23:34.080 --> 0:23:38.280 has decided about six hundred cases and it was mentioned 0:23:38.320 --> 0:23:41.040 that the hearing that nine percent of them have not 0:23:41.200 --> 0:23:46.280 been reversed. So that was something that was maybe anticipated 0:23:46.359 --> 0:23:48.920 to be a bigger deal than it ended up being. 0:23:49.080 --> 0:23:52.080 And the questions she did get about that kind of 0:23:52.080 --> 0:23:55.520 throwing her to talk about her record were remotely from Democrats. 0:23:55.720 --> 0:23:58.240 Were you expecting to see a hearing where there was 0:23:58.320 --> 0:24:02.800 some fireworks and a lot of tough, confrontational questioning. I mean, 0:24:02.880 --> 0:24:07.920