Its i guess i would just say live life to the fullest, season all of the opportunities you have, and do your best. But at the same time never let work crowd out all of the other precious things in your life, like friends, and family, and faith, and exercise, i had a law professor who told first years who were very, very anxious to study hard to make sure you gave yourself time to go take a run or go work out p i think all of those things that make up our lives, apart from work, you know, cant be shoved aside. At the same time however you should season opportunity, and pursue them while keeping in mind your whole person. Yes, the whole person. Thank you. When we sat down i told you a little bit about my daughter libby, she is studying prelaw right now. She sent me a text this morning as we were in this room. And she said, i have to fisk an article on judge barrett. We had this discussion about fis king a while back. I had to ask her what it was and i googled it to make sure i had the right definition i dont know what it is. The process of sledding a written argument many line by line, parsing the meaning and providing counter points. So their instructor provided the class different articles about you, and they have to go through now and fisk the article. And she said, okay, here is the whole task, i have to fisk an article on judge barrett, and honestly, what an amazing woman. So, i just want to share that, that little built of encouragement, that while there may be others on this committee that disagree, i would share with you that there are thousands upon thousands of young women out there that see the role that you set and i went through all of those descriptive words that my fellow members have shared through the course of these hearings, but those thousands and thousands of young women that seal you as someone they can aspire to be. And i know that she is in a very Diverse Group of friends. Theyre racially different, they are religiously different. But theyre all young warriors. All of these young women. But they are very excited to have you in front of us. I would say that many of her friends are not republican, they would affiliate more with democrats as well. But they do see you as someone they can aspire to be. So thank you so much for setting such a great example for women of all different thought processes. And what words of encouragement would you like to share with the young women like my daughter libby . I think i would say to be confident. To see what she wants, to have a plan. One thing ive often told my own daughters is that you shouldnt let life just happen to you, or sweep you along. You should identify what your objectives are and identify the kind of person that you want to be and then make deliberate decisions to make that happen. My dad used to tell us not to make a decision is to make a decision. So i would say make decisions, be confident, no what you want and go get it. That is fantastic. And you know i have four tenants that i live by, or pillars of success. Those four pillars are leadership, service, risk and gratitude, and so you know i would like just to give you a couple minutes. Youve already spoken to a few of those. Youve talked about service. And what it means to serve your nation. And you actually went through prudent risk, in deciding to subject your family, your friends, yourself to this process, deciding it was for the greater good. I would like to give you just a moment to express some gratitude as well for those that have helped you get where you are today, and share maybe how they mentored you along the way sure. Well i mean i think as for probably so many people my parents are the ones who have to express the most gratitude for. Because you know theyve well gosh they encouraged me at every step of the way. Theyve encouraged me and supported me and loved me and shaped me and given the values that i have, and then as ive had my own family and my own children, then theyve helped me by supporting me with my children and reinforcing what they taught me. My professors in law school, we heard the other day from former dean oh har ra who was gracious enough to introduce me on the panel. I had so many wonderful professors when i was in law school, i had so many wonderful colleagues onesy joined the faculty. When i was in practice i had so many lawyers that i learned so much from. And then we talked at great electric about judge silver man and Justice Scalia the justices for whom i worked. They say it takes a village to raise a child. I think it takes a village to mentor anyone into who they become as an adult. Im thankful for the village ive had that brought me to this point. Wonderful, thank you very much judge barrett. Thank you. Senator booker. Mr. Chairman. Thank you very much. Your honor, hi senator. How are you . Im good. You. Im doing well. Doing well. Im sure that part of that smile is the fact that im the secondtothelast democrat [ laughter ] i just want to jump right in, i actually found some of your responses to senator hirono really compelling around the public charge issue and that you sent you dissent in the case. If i can read it. You wrote that at the bottom, the plaintiffs objections reflect disagreement with the policy choice. Even the statutory exclusion itself, litigation is not the vehicle for re solving policy disputes. Because i think the dhss definition is a rational interpretation of the statutory term public charge. But you were saying to her, which i really found compelling, that you were still leaving the door open for it to be capricious. Was that the word you used . Yes. So the standard of review under the administrative procedure act would be arbitrary and capricious. I said at the conclusion of the dissent because the majority reached both. I said that i wasnt resolving that issue because it hadnt been briefed before us bully just wasnt expressing an opinion and i thought we needed a fuller record. I thought the ruling would nonetheless be arbitrary and capricious. As i said trying to read all of your cases has been a herculean task. Maybe i can just go back to asking just a simple question that i hope you will feel comfortable asking, its what i think is an obvious answer again. Do you think its wrong to separate children from their parents to deter immigrants from coming to the United States . Senator booker thats been a matter of policy debate and the obviously thats a matter of hot political debate in which i cant express a view or be drawn into as a judge. So i respect that a lot. But i think the underlying question is actually not hotly debated, and just maybe ill ask it one more time. Do you think its wrong to separate a child from their parent not for the safety of the child or parent but to send a message . As a human being do you believe thats wrong senator i think youre trying to engage me on the administrations order, separation policies, and i cant express a view on that. So im not expressing ascent or dissent with the more rat of that position, i cant be drawn into a debate about the administrations immigration policy. Of course the question has implications but as i said to you yesterday were debating things, these are basic questions of human rights, human decency and human dignity. Im sorry we cant have a simple affirmation of what i think most americans would agree on. Maybe i can jump back to something we began yesterday. I asked you whether you were familiar with studies conducted by the us Sentencing Commission. Do you remember . Yes. I said i was generally aware. Are you talking about when we talked about systemic or implicit bias . Yes. Yes im general aware there have been studies down. The u. S. Sentencing commission provides nonbinding guidelines to federal judges which showed some of the rarnl disspare thes in our criminal Justice System. My colleagues go and i have worked on criminal Justice Reform and some were examples that federal prosecutors are more likely to charge black defendants with black defendants in similar pri situated white defendants and black defendants were to three strike laws sentencing enhancements at a significantly higher rate than white defendants. Which added ten years to their sentence a significant seasoning of liberty. You said you were not familiar with that particular study as you just affirmed or the facts that they cite in the still showing the i want racial bias prejudice in our system. In our discussion i think it came out these issues of bias in our criminal Justice System or manifest in many aspects of the system. From police misconduct, unlawful use of force, prosecutor bias, sentencing disparties. These are wide and vast areas, that have been shown to have such implement racial bias evident in them. This year, clearly, weve been grappling as a nation with a lot of these issues. And it is a part of our long standing history. You cannot divorce the role of judges in our history over these some 200 years, and how race has been a persist sent part of the national narrative, grappling with deep issues of bigotry and bias, overt as well as the biases that exist. We know that many of the unjust deaths of unarmed African Americans at the hands of Law Enforcement have brought this even more into public concern. So i just want to ask you and give you more of a chance to discussion, i understand you werent aware of specific studies i cited which are central to the important work of the u. S. Sentencing commission which advises federal judges or provides recommendations to federal judges, i want to give you an opportunity to share what studies, articles, books, law review articles or commentary you have read regarding racial disspare thes present in our criminal Justice System . Senator as you know the sentencing guidelines do give judges guidance on imposing sentences. So i am familiar with the sentencing guidelines because theyre something when we review sentences that you know we need to draw on and apply. In addition to the sentencing guidelines, the Sentencing Commission as you say, does issue studies or sometimes we get things from the federal Judicial Center that talk about. Im certainly aware of it, i think its kind of an obvious point. Forgive me for interrupting, and im concerned because joanie ens who has been teaching me about iowa, i dont her to get mad, but i was actually asking specifically any books you have read on the subject or law review articles . Anything specifically that you read outside of the sentencing guidelines senator booker i would say what i have learned about it has mostly been in conversations with people. At notre dame as at many different universities a topic of conversation in classrooms but its not something that i can say yes ive done research on this and read. I respect that, youve answered the question. One of the greatest drivers of disparties, partners of mine on both sides of the aisle has been the war on drugs which really is a war on black and brown people because of the outrageous disspare thes, no difference using drugs but blacks are multiple more times to be arrested. At stanford, lots of use not a lot of arrests. One of the most tragic examples of this, partnership on both sides of the aisle was crack powder disparties which provided harsh unbalanced penalties. Someone caught with the amount of crack cocaine the size of a candy bar as someone caught with a briefcase full of powdered cocaine. This is wildly unjust. When the Sentencing Commission wrote something to address, you actually wrote a law review article, in a wellknown legal academic not a law review article you wrote a blog post in a wellknown legal academic that cited this decision and you questioned whether that was a wise call. In fairness as i reread it today you raised the administrative hurdles in retroactively reducing sentences which would provide relief to 20 thousand americans who had their liberty taken away from them. But never in the blog article did you mention this was unjust. There was no deference to how serious this is, for the 20 thousand americans, 98 are black and brown, you just questioned why are we doing this . Could you tell me why . Sure. Senator booker i think what youre referring to is a short blog post on the law prove blog and it wasnt an indepth exploration of the crack cocaine disparity or anything like that. It was simply pointing out the administrative hurdles, my husband was a federal prosecutor at the time and that had been table talk at the house. The complex at this time of at this of let voe actively going back. I think it was probably not more than a paragraph and it was simplifying the administrative hurdles because theyre clearly, whenever you apply retroactive reform there are administrative hurdles going forward. Youre a law professor, this is a long article, a couple pages worth, and im wondering the law prove blog. I have it here in the font that my old eyes cant see. I cant see it either. Youre not citing articles youve read but you have written here on if. It makes me wonder and want to talk to you a little bit about your prepared ness and priorities taking the highest office in the judicial world that deals with long standing issues of race, and in a way that affects the totality of the lives of americans, in every aspect of their life. Financial wellbeing to their rights to vote. I would like to go through as quickly as i can in my remaining ten minutes a little bit about the vastness of this problem. And why im very concerned that you havent even cited anything that you have read that would speak to this or the only writings i could find on it dont talk to the injustice of it all. You had a conversation with senator klobuchar about voting. I just want to know have you ever waited five hours to vote . I have not. Have you ever waited over an hour even . I have not. Yeah well in wisconsin a state in your circuit we saw the travesty during the primary earlier this year during the panned December Mick that many polling places were closed and lines were incredibly long. In milwaukee a city of more than half a Million People located in a county with 70 percent of that states black population, we literally saw out of the citys 180 polling places only five were open. Pushing people into hours and hours long wait. Now comparatively, 66 polling places were open in the city of madison a predominantly white city half of the size of milwaukee k the u. S. Supreme court made this worse with a rule that restricted mail in voti voting where this is part of a nationwide problem with racial disspare thes in voting. Residents are entirely black neighborhoods wait almost 30 longer in lines to vote. And they were 74 more likely to spend more than half an hour at the polling place. Now your dissent in kanter versus bar you said something about virtue based restrictions which really raised by concern. And that virtue based restrictions have applied to civic rights like voting and jury service, not individual rights to possess a gun. This approach to the franchise pulls up a lot offist history where people used virtue based restrictions in the past thats been very well documented in our history. You can disenfranchise people if they dont meet certain virtue tests. Many i know youre aware of. Are you worthy enough if you cant say the whole declaration of independence . These are tests that john lewis talked about. Can you count the bubbles in a bar of soap . Youre familiar with that im sure senator i want to be very clear. I tried to clear this up yesterday. This concept of virtue i think especially for people who are watching this who dont know about the law, does not mean that i think that peoples Voting Rights can be taken away because theyre not good people or because i think literacy tests are okay. Its a concept that kanter versus bar was not about Voting Rights and i have clearly said voting is at an individual and fundamental right. You would say voting is critical to your democracy. The point i was making is the 14th amendment does express sir indicate states might avoid youre jumping to felonies, i asked you about polls, i tried to point out one place where africans waiting so much longer than you and i may have waited, im trying to ask you about poll taxes unconstitutional, yes . I was pointing on out what the felony disenfranchisement, kanter versus bar, i was saying that the context in which i discussed it. I think section two of the Voting Rights acts which prohibits procedures and practices right. Right. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Youre jumping ahead and i spent so much time on my questioning. [ laughter ] so lets jump though, lets jump ahead to this. Obviously the case in florida that youre well aware of, i imagine where we had significant felony disenfranchisement. Ive read about the history going back to the post civil war, fall of reconstruction, thousands of blacks being listenched, mass customers mass sa customers taking place. Designing felonies disenfranchisement laws, easy to disenfranchise lots of African American votes. Now we see places like florida and believe me there are devils of disenfranchisement, one in american one in 17 are unable to vote because of felony disenfranchisement. I see in your face thats oh oh 774 thousand people in florida have completed their felony sentences and are being prevented from voting because they owe fines and fees. Theyre being subject to a modern days tax. If im wealthy enough i can pay that, if im after fray cant american i cant do that. One in five couldnt vote because of felony disenfranchisement. This is well documented. Ive gone through some of it. As you are seeking the highest level in the land, another study by the american bar association, which i recommend to you, shows that a person with a felony commitment in america is subject to 340 thousand collateral consequences. In other words we now have in america the war on mary wanna, marijuana marijuana. There were more arrests for marijuana than all the arrests. Overwhelmingly at yale and stanford, not notre dame, just played them in football, but my point is, you see, that if a black person is not more likely to use marijuana but theyre more likely to be condition friblthd of a felony for it at three to four times the rate i hope you can see that means theyre going to be more likely to lose other liberties, other rights that so deeply affects their lives, their vote ing life. Their alive to raise a children because of the felony conflicts were doing things that two of the last three president s admitted to doing, they the cant vote, get jobs, get business licenses. This is such a deeply affecting system, that it is disproportionately harming one class of citizens based upon race. And so here we are in the midst of, i return to the not normalcy of this moment in american history. Where you cant turn on the tv and watch basketball without cure rage juice athletes trying to talk to the heart of america to say please listen. Please listen. The system is endangering lives . Taking away liberty. Taking away your financial wellbeing, taking you away from your children. There are people marching in all 50 states. 18 other countries. Because African Americans, when theyre jogging, sleeping in their home, are being killed. And we have a nation now where were doing a Supreme Court justice hearing the last days of appling election to a president who cant even condemn White Supremacy, where he tells White Supremacy groups stand by. Where theyre men asking and literally recuting people to do poll watching which many people have sounded the alarm in african communities dredging up memories of the past of people in 2i78 my dating people at polling places. People protesting all leading to an election where this issue and roe v wade and Peoples Health care is going to be on the ballot but were acting like this is normal. And i have a great deal of respect for my colleagues because some of my colleagues have stepped up, calling out studies and articles and writings from the heritage foundation, indicate toe foundation aei who all spoke to with data and facts the pervasiveness of racial disspare thes. Disparity its. America, something is going on where the New York Times best seller list, amazon best seller list had books stamped, the color of law, just mercy, new jim crow, best sellers, people seeking to know what the facts are. And so i hope you understand my heart when i look at a justice who it seems that the fix is in, is going to serve on the Supreme Court, and hasnt taken steps to understand the pervasiveness, the facts, the truth about cases of race that are going to come before you in a system right now that so many people feel like is unjust. Those words written on the building of the Supreme Court, equal justice under law, doesnt apply to them. Because they see as Brian Stephenson says we still live in a country if youre rich and guilty than if youre poor and innocent. So i appreciate the conversation that we had, and i wish we had more time, but theres a lot of fear as i talked to you about yesterday. Theres a great deal of concern about the way this is being done. And i just am deeply worried about the implications to the fabric of our nation as i said to you in our phone conversation, about the way this is being handled. And so im very grateful with the decorum and candor with which youve answered my questions. I hope you feel ive treated you in the same way yes. Thank you senator booker. Thank you senator. Senator crapo my staff is telling me i should have said this. Without objection. Whatever it is you and the justice are both trying to jump ahead. Whatever it is. I appreciate you mr. Senator, and the work that you and i have done. Thank you very much. I would like to ask unanimous consent to offer the following three letters into the record. A letter from the Leadership Conference on civil and human rights opposing justice barrettes nomination to the Supreme Court k83 young people opposi opposing, a letter from lgbtq advocacy groups opposing any nomination where reasonable doubts exist on her ability to admin strer fair and impartial for the lgbtq. Thank you without objection. Senator crapo. Thank you mr. Chairman. Judge barrett grad to see you again likewise. Before i begin my comments and questions, i think there was at least an implication from what was just said that you would not be sensitive to the needs for equal justice for all for all peoples in america. Would you like to respond to that . I am fully committed to equal justice under the law for all persons. I am fully committed to enforcing all laws to prohibit Racial Discrimination. Until my private life i abhor Racial Discrimination and obviously for both personal and professional reasons, want to ensure that there is equal justice for all. And you know, all of my children i think have mailed an escape but if they have watched this one day, i would want all of them to know and especially vivian and john peter that i condemn racism and want to do everything i can in my personal way and professional way to end it. Thank you. I appreciate you making that point. I find it Justin Credible that a mother of children of different raises could be accused of not being sensitive nor willing to protect the rights of all under the constitution. Before i go on with my questions, once again has happened both two days ago and yesterday and again today theres a couple things i think that need to be set straight in the record. First of all once again today it was said we should not be holding these proceedings because we should be dealing with the pandemic. First of all, the senate can do more than one thing at one time. Secondly as i indicated before, weve put over a 500 billion package of relief dealing with most every important and significant aspect of our need to Covid Response on the floor, it has been philando by the other side. The president has made an even larger offer back. That has been flatly rejected and we have had an announcement recently by the leader of the Senate Mitch Mcconnell and well vote again next week on the issue to see if there is some way we can get an agreement to move forward. But the argument that we should simply ignore this important nomination because of that holds no water. Second liz another of the major points that this entire hearing was starts out with on the first day, was that people should be scared by these proceedings because they will lose coverage, Health Care Coverage for their preexisting conditions. That has been again run out here today, time and time again. Im not going to ask you to go through that but im going to make a couple comments on that. As i said earlier in these hearings even back when we were debating obamacare there was no disagreement about covering preexisting conditions. And in every proposal from our side sins that time, coverage for preexisting conditions has been included. It is not something that there is an effort to or a willingness or a desire to eliminate in terms of protection and it is not at risk in the Supreme Court case as you have i think very clearly described in your testimony judge barrett. With regard to that if those assurances and facts dont make it clear. Senator difficult tillis has introduced legislation called the property text act that will put into law once again protections for preexisting conditions in our Health Care Coverage, and every one of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle voted no, to stop that from moving forward. Its there, the protect act is in the senate. We can vote on it, if we can get permission to proceed to it from our colleagues. This notion that preexisting conditions is somehow at jeopardy is simple rolling out yet again in this Campaign Cycle another one of the arguments that doesnt hold water. Now i do want to move to some questions for you judge barrett. And again, of it after it was extensively discussed yesterday and the day before, you have been attacked on the basis of concerns about your willingness to follow precedent and stare decisis. One of my colleagues if go i heard it right said he thought that you may participate in issuing in a whole new era of judicial activism in over ruling precedent of the courts and basically pushing an agenda that you wont admit to having. I know you answered this a lot yesterday. Were going to go through it again. One of the things that you were talking that you were asked about extensively was this i think 2013 law review article where a sentence was plucked out of it that you feel was not correctly reflective of what you said and how you feel. Would you please would you like to take an app opportunity to clarify that for us . Sure. That article was responding, so as ive said a couple times, the Supreme Court gives different president did he know shall strength to constitutional cases and statutory cases. That article was responding to arguments that either stare decisis should be eliminated all together or it should be absolute. And i was taking the Supreme Court doctrine as it exists, you know, where constitutional cases are not absolutely insulated from overruling, which is the position that every Supreme Court justice of which im aware has it. Sometimes you have to overrule cases or we dont have cases like brown versus board of education. I was defending in that article the current supreme kourpt doctrine of stare decisis and i very clearly said in that article that you cant just impose a new vision with votes, you have to take reliance, interests, and that always lack of certainty about how the stairs dees calculus runs councils in favor of keeping the status quo. Did you. I found it amazing that you would be confused with being a judicial act test. You are a textist and an originalist as i understand your testimony, record and writings. I would like to look the a few of your writings, you have described stare decisis as a fixture of the federal judicial system. You have stated that the Supreme Court that you recognize that the Supreme Court follows a presumption that president dent will if stand and that the court does not dee part from that position unless the precedent is not only erroneous and unworkable also has to take into accounted reliance, interests and those other factors. That was next on my list, you anticipated. Im sorry. And you have spent a lot of time and i wont ask you to do it again, going through those requirements that are in place before a judge or a justice would seek to become an activist in the sense of over turning existing precedent of the court. And youve also said that partisan politics are not a good reason for over turning precedent. I assume that goes without saying, correct . Lets look at those are some of your writings and youve written much more but lets look at some of the case law. Youve got a pretty significant record now, in the 7th circuit. You have, as i see it, a pretty solid record there of following precedent. The first issue is in 2019 you had a discussion with judge thapar yes. And i think, could you please explain that conversation . It related i think to a case where you were clarifying that even though you disagreed in a previous circumstance related to it you would follow precedent i recall the conversation, we did it for a professor in the Political Science department to primarily an undergrad class. We answered questions on a particular range of topics. This was a scenario you were asked about. Okay you made the clarification anything that scenario you would decide a case or a case consistent with the way the majority did and not with your own view with the precedent required it so if i had dissent the first time around in law . Thats aware recently what that was all about. Lets talk about a couple cases. Price versus the city of chicago you joined in affirming opinion over a District Courts dismissal of a suit by prolife activists. Do you recall that case i do. What role did precedent play there. Precedent controlled a case called hill versus colorado. The bubble sewn issue and price was nearly identical to the one the court up held in hill. Even though in this case you overruled and followed precedent s. Correct. Correct. In let versus the city of chicago you applied the Supreme Courts test for evaluating Public Employees speech. Do you recall that case yes. You followed the precedent. In chasen versus marske the 7th circuit held in light of the United States v mathis and a subsequent 7th Circuit Court no longer qualified as predicate offenses under certain cripple until that acts again following precedent of the Supreme Court and the 7th circuit. Im just picking out a few, you have a very full record of these. In my view, i only found one case, where you actually did not follow 7th circuit precedent. And that was the case of groves versus the United States. And i dont know if you recall that case i do. Why didnt you follow 7th circuit precedent then . So in that case there was precedent that was old on points and the Supreme Court had issued a series of subsequent decisions which called our prior precedent into doubt. So the 7th circuit has a rule called circuit rule 40e. And when we conclude as a full court, you circulate an opinion to the full court to say i think our president should be overruled, in this case because it had fallen out of step with later developments in the Supreme Court, i circulated that precedent or the opinion pursuant to 40e and the full court agreed. We overruled precedent. So the way i would summarize that is that you, the court, with your support, be overruled the 7th circuit precedent because the Supreme Court precedent overruled that. Not directly overruled it, but the Supreme Court president dent undercut it. You were following Supreme Court precedent to take that action. Yes. Lets look at our cases. Im going to go through statistics here statistics sometimes get outdated, if these are not accurate please tell me but what i have before me tells me youre authored is that a correct number i dont know. So i will take your word for it alright. Well, thats what my information says. Okay. And it says that you have participated in the disposition. Does that sound approximately accurate . I think i have the numbers that i have looked at recently suggested that i have participated in 600 panels that were appellate, but close to a thousand matters including things that stay, circuits of appeal, stay applications, et cetera. My understanding is, again these statistics might vary because the numbers are different than you say but i think this is pretty accurate, that your majority opinions have been unanimous 95 of the time, in other words almost always when you join a majority its a unanimous conclusion of the panel. Is that correct . Thats my understanding. Ive seen that statistic. The statistics i say its 95 of the time that its unanimous for the decisions of the panel. According to crs youve only dissenting 1. 84 of the time. That ranks you 6th among the 11 active judges of the circuit, which is right about in the middle. This report also says that your reported majority opinions it drew disents 6. 14 of the time which ranks you 6th among the 11 active judges, right about in the middle. It says the majority opinions 7. 69 of the time. That ranks you 8th among the eleven active judges of the Circuit Court which means your opinions were some of the least likely to draw a dissent or concurrence. The point of the statistics is this is not the record of someone who is an activist, in over turning president dent. This is the record of someone who follows precedent. I just want to thank you for being that kind of a judge because thats one of the reasons im so glad to support you as we move forward. Now again, unfortunately, today, once again, and i thought we had this resolved yesterday, youve been challenged on what you knew about the president s positions and whether that influenced your positions. It was implied a law he review you wrote before the president was president was that you were influenced in your writing because you knew what the president thought. Were going to have to go back and ask you these questions about. Youve already said yesterday that the president didnt talk to you, his staff didnt talk to you. No one talked to you about roe versus wade. Ogerfeld or california versus texas and you made no commitment wants made no commitment wants on those cases or any other case. That was my question. Today its been implied that you basically have been if following the president s statements, his tweets, even things that he may have felt or believed before he was president , and trying to make it make your decisions consistent with that. So once again has the president or his team or anyone talked to you about any case or received a commitment from you about how you would rule on any case . No, senator crapo. Alright. I hope that we can once again put that one to rest. Could you also once again restate, is anybody above the law in the United States . No one is above the law in the United States. Alright. Thank you very much. I told you yesterday before i quit that i was going to ask you a few soft balls [ laughter ] sometimes soft balls turn out not to be soft balls. Go ahead. I think this will. I just want to ask you, these are some of my hard balls, im going to leave those because ive only got three minutes left. I just want to talk to you for a minute about action december i cant. What led you to your decision to move out of practice into academia . Well when i was in law school, i thought i might like to teach some day, because i really like teaching. I considered being a teacher, i mean being a secondary School Teacher was actually one of the things i thought about, too, be in college. As i said in my speech up at the announcement of my nomination my mom was a teacher, my dad was a lawyer, combined that might explain howie wound up being a law professor. I loved the idea of teaching students. I liked the idea of communicating with clarities, you know, complicated doctrines to them, to help them. I have very much enjoyed teaching the 2000 students that ive taught and mentoring them as young adults embarking on their careers, in many cases have not had much time between law school and launching their careers its been a rewarding experience. Youve been very influential on that, so many of your students and colleagues speak so highly of you. You anticipated two of my questions about it, i have one more to ask. That is what was your favorite class to teach . Oh its hard to pick a favorite. Its like asking who is your favor. Child . I really en soil anded constitutional law overlapped with the things i was writing about. I taught evidence mostly because they needed somebody to do it. Whats funny about that is i didnt do scholarships about evidence it wasnt part of my interests and i was doing it as service, its called a Service Class because Everyone Needs to take it. It turned out to be really fun to teach just because it was fun to be able to engage students in interactive circumstances and i could use movie clips and it of turned out to be fun to teach even though it didnt overlap with what i was writing about. Thank you, it is an honor for me to be able to support you in this nomination. Thank you. Thank you. Senator harris im here, can you hear me . Yes, maam. The floor is yours okay. Thank you mr. Chairman. Judge barrett earlier today you described the Voting Rights act as quote a triumph of of the civil rights movement. As you know the Voting Rights acts was not an triumph. I think its important to acknowledge its history. This year our nation has mourned the loss of a Great American hero, congressman john lewis. He was one of our countrys greatest leaders because he have inspired us to fight for a more perfect union. Every year john lewis would invite a bunch of us members of congress, faith leaders, others, to join him in selma, alabama, for a walk across the edmonton bridge, and it was there that he would remind everyone of americas history, and the history of the fact that for generations black americans were denied their constitutional right to vote. He also reminded us of the brutality, that so Many Americans face when fighting for the Voting Rights of black people and all people. And history reminds us that some states as a condition of voting, require black americans to answer impossible questions, like take a look at that jar of jelly beans and if youre gonna vote you need to tell us how many jelly beans are in the jar. There were questions asked of folks in order for them to vote. They would have to tell the official how many bubbles are in a bar of soap . Impossible questions, obviously. Some states required black people who had been system cli and systematically to equal Educational Opportunities to answer questions like how often is the federal census taken or when is Inauguration Day . When one of these malicious questions was asked they were challenged as you can imagine. And many were struck down. But when will that happened, those states and municipalities would just put up new restrictions and new obstacles kls for is folks to photo. Folks were beaten when they tried to vote or registered to vote, including congressman lewis. Thats why after so much pressure and marching, the peaceful protests from civil rights activists that in 1965 Congress Finally passed the Voting Rights act to end discriminatory voting practices. The Voting Rights act priors states who had a history, this is important, who had a history of denying black americans and other minorities the right to vote, to get approval, from the federal government before they changed the voting laws. And for almost 50 years the Voting Rights act did what congress intended. It allowed the federal government to monitor and guard against of voter suppression. But as we all know in 2013 in shelby v holder a county in alabama sued to strike down section five of the Voting Rights act that required alabama to seek approval from the federal government before a state could change its voting laws. Section five required that of a number of states that had a documented history of vote early suppression. Now judge barrett i know many of my colleagues have asked you about this case but i think its important we revisit it. By a 54 vote the court gutted the Voting Rights act and ended the requirement that states and low cats with a history of the discrimination get federal approval before changing their voting laws. The majority of the Supreme Court justices failed to understand that the success in combatting voter suppression, directly was a function of our ability to enforce section five of the Voting Rights act. So the success was due to the brilliance of section five of the Voting Rights act which gave us enforcement capabilities, and monitoring capabilities. As has been mentioned, just two months after the courts gutted the Voting Rights act, North Carolina passed laws that made it so much more difficult for black americans to vote that a federal court of appeal mentioned that it quote targeted African Americans with almost surgical precision. Texas has a long history of Racial Discrimination in voting. Therefore also covered by the Voting Rights act. After section five was gutted in shelby texas quickly returned to some of its discriminatory voting practices. Of the more than 1600 polling places closed after the courts decision at least 750 were in texas. Texas also restricted interpretation for English Limited voters. And this year, the governor of texas issued an order that limited the number of drop boxes for completed mail in ballots to just one per county. Before the order, Harris County texas which includes houston, and has eleven ballot drop off locations, in a county of over four million residents and a county that covers about 2000 square miles many people would say it is just common sense that going from 11 drop boxes to what it did, which is to reduce it to one single dropbox has made it more difficult for people to vote. The Supreme Court has long recognized that our right to vote is fundamental because it preserves and parole text all other rights. No right is more precious in our democracy. Any nominee to the Supreme Court must understand the effect of ongoing efforts to disscream nate against black americans, la tina know americans, native americans, students and other americans of color. Sins the decision in shelby at least 23 states have passed restrictive votings laws and have attempted to stop early voting and take peoples names off the voter rolls that should not have been removed. Judge barrett in Shelby County chief Justice Roberts wrote voting discrimination still exists, no one doubts that. My question to you is do you agree with Justice Roberts statement senator harris, i want to just make sure that i understand, my understanding of what remains of the Voting Rights act, what happened in Shelby County is consistent with what youre state trisha garcia. The preclearance remains in place and what the Supreme Courted held on constitutional is the coverage formula. So some states which in 1965 had a history of discrimination had to get preclearance whenever they changed anything having to do with their voting precede you ares and other states didnt. I think Shelby County said congress can pass a new coverage formula now, articulating the formula for jurisdictions that are required for preclearance. Judge barrett, my question however is do you agree with chief Justice Roberts who said voting discrimination still exists, no one doubts that . Do you agree with that statement . Senator harris i will not comment on what any justice said in an opinion, whether an opinion is right or wrong or endorse that proposition. Well im asking so do you call it a proposition or a fact . Are you saying you do not agree with the fact . Sent sent im not going to make a comment. Im not going to say that i endorse either the majority or the dissent in the case of Shelby County. But i just want to understand. Are you saying that you will you refuse to dispute a known fact or that you refuse to agree with a known fact . Senator im not exactly sure what youre getting at with asking me to endorse a fact or whether any particular practice constitutes voter discrimination. Im happy to say that i think Racial Discrimination still exists in the United States and i think weve seen evidence of that this summer. But as discrimination exists in america in any form . Senator harris, there have been cases, weve talked in this hearing about the wisconsin case that went up to the court, involving voting. I think any anything, any opinion that i would express, and i dont mean to signal that i disagree with the statement either. What i mean to say is im not going to express an opinion because these are very charged issues. They have been litigated in the courts. So i will not engage on that question. During your confirmation hearing in 200035 chief Justice Roberts was asked about the constitutionality of section two, which i think you referred to earlier of the Voting Rights act, quote i have no basis for reviewing section two on is constitutionally suspect and i dont. Judge barrett do you agree that section two of the Voting Rights act is constitutional . I think that chief Justice Roberts statement i have no basis for viewing it as constitutional suspect would be the same as mine. Im not aware of any constitutional law existing that would create a question about it. Thank you. Senator hirono mentioned yesterday in a 2018 case before the Supreme Court a group of workers were denied overtime pay and joined together to file a lawsuit against their employer. The corporation argued that workers didnt have the right to go to courts as a and could only raise disputes in arbitration individually. Unlike a court proceeding, arbitration is private. The process is hidden from the public and generally cannot be reviewed for fairness by a court. In many cases people are forced to agree to arbitration if they want to get the job. In 2018 because of a forced arbitration clause the workers could not go to a court to fight for overtime and instead were forced to fight for overtime pay behind closed doors in a private arbitration. Justice ginsburg in dissent noted the workers faced a choice arbitration on their employers terms or give up their jobs. She explained quote employees must have the capacity to act collectively in order to match their ployers clout in setting terms of employment. She urged the court to consider the stream imbalance of power in our nations work spaces and avoid further undermining coming do you recognize justice ginsbergs point, there is extreme between Large Corporation and individual workers . Hon. Amy Coney Barrett senator harris, i will give you the same answer with respect to the sentence from chief roberts opinion in Shelby County. I will not engage in critiquing or embracing portions of opinions, especially opinions