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Thursday round-up

For USA Today, Richard Wolf reports that “Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh responded to more than 1,000 written questions from dissatisfied Democrats Wednesday by revealing more about his personal finances but little more about his views on the law.” At The National Law Journal (subscription or registration required), Marcia Coyle and Tony Mauro highlight some of Kavanaugh’s answers to more than a thousand written questions posed by senators … in the wake of [Kavanaugh’s] confirmation hearing last week.” Additional coverage comes from Paulina Dedaj at Fox News, Seung Min Kim for The Washington Post, Lisa Mascaro at the Associated Press, and Ariane de Vogue and Phil Mattingly at CNN, who report that “Kavanaugh said he would have shaken hands and spoken with the father of a Parkland school shooting victim last week had he realized who he was.”

As the Senate Judiciary Committee continues to consider Kavanaugh’s nomination, Democratic senators and progressive groups are amplifying their concerns about the nominee. At Roll Call, Todd Ruger reports that “Senate Democrats have added a new line of attack against … Kavanaugh, accusing the longtime appeals court judge of misleading or even lying under oath during his confirmation hearing last week.” Richard Cowan and Lawrence Hurley report at Reuters that Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., “raised new questions about whether … Kavanaugh has accurately described his role in a controversial judicial nomination when he worked for then-President George W. Bush.” Jordain Carney reports at The Hill that “Senate Democrats will move forward this week with suing to get access to documents tied to … Kavanaugh.”

For The Washington Post, Eli Rosenberg detects signs that an “unusual crowdfunding campaign” by “a group of liberal activists in Maine” soliciting pledges to be contributed in 2020 to a Democrat challenging Sen. Susan Collins, R-Me., if Collins votes for Kavanaugh’s confirmation “could be backfiring.” At The New York Times, Sheryl Gay Stolberg and others report that Collins has called “’[t]This quid pro quo fund-raising campaign … the equivalent of an attempt to bribe me.’” The editorial board of The Wall Street Journal agrees, suggesting that “the next time progressives complain about the menace of money in politics,” they should be reminded “of their failure to object to the crowdfunding bribe offered to Senator Collins.” At Slate, Richard Hasen argues that claims by Republican election lawyer Cleta “Mitchell and others that the fundraising effort is illegal are wrong, in part thanks to the deregulated campaign finance system that Mitchell and others have helped to create through litigation and a sympathetic Supreme Court.”

At Rewire.News, Jessica Mason Pieklo talks to the teenage survivor of the Parkland, Florida, school shooting who testified last Friday at Kavanaugh’s hearing in an effort “to make the senators look at the human cost of Kavanaugh’s views on gun rights.” In an op-ed for The Hill, Dr. Roger Klein explains why, “[w]hen future Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh is confirmed later this month, the unsung hero of the battle will be Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa).” In an op-ed for The New York Times, Linda Greenhouse “consider[s] the impact of Judge Kavanaugh’s arrival on the eight other justices — on the dynamic of the Supreme Court as a whole,” wondering what “the Supreme Court [will] look like when neither side has to walk on eggs to win the favor of the one in the middle.”

Briefly:

  • In an essay for The Atlantic, Justice Stephen Breyer maintains that “[i]nternational law, the domestic laws and customs of other nations, and the decisions of foreign courts have become part of today’s American judicial experience.”

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Recommended Citation: Edith Roberts, Thursday round-up, SCOTUSblog (Sep. 13, 2018, 7:15 AM), https://www.scotusblog.com/2018/09/thursday-round-up-442/