Transcripts For MSNBCW MTP Daily 20201013

Together. Center for media and democracy has done a little more research. Heres a Bradley Foundation memo that theyve published. The Bradley Foundation is reviewing a Grant Application asking for money for this orchestrated amicus process. And what do they say in this recommendation . Its important to orchestrate, their word, not mine. Important to orchestrate high caliber amicus efforts before the court. They also note that bradley has done previous philanthropic investments in the actual underlying legal actions. So bradley is funding what do they call it, phil anthropically investing in the underlying legal action and then giving money to groups to show up in the orchestrated chorus of anarchy. That cant be good. And it goes on because they also say this email. This email comes from an individual at the Bradley Foundation, and it asks our friend leonard leo who used to run the selection process, is there a 501c3 nonprofit to which bradley could direct any support of the two Supreme Court amicus projects other than donors trust . I dont know why they wanted to avoid the reliable identity scrubber donors trust but for some reason they did. Leonard leo writes back on Federalist Society address. On Federalist Society on his address he writes back, yes, send it to the judicial education project which could take and allocate the money. And guess who works for the judicial education project . Carrie severino. Who also helped select this nominee running the trump Federalist Society selection process. So the connections abound. In the Washington Post article, they point out the Judicial Crisis Networks office is on the same hallway in the same building as the Federalist Society and that when they sent their reporter to talk to somebody at the Judicial Crisis Network, somebody from the Federalist Society came down to let them up. This more and more looks like its not three schemes, but its one scheme with the same funders selecting judges, funding campaigns for the judges and then showing up in court in these orchestrated amicus flotillas to tell the judges what to do. On the Judicial Crisis Network youve got the leonard leo connection. Obviously, she hopped in to take over for him with the Federalist Society. Youve got the campaigns that ive talked about where they take 17 million contributions. Thats a big check to write. 17 million to campaign for Supreme Court nominees. No idea who that is or what they got for it. Youve got briefs that she wrote. The republican senators filed briefs in that nfib case signed by ms. Severino. The woman who helped choose this nominee has written briefs for republican senators attacking the aca. Dont say the aca is not an issue here. And by the way, the Judicial Crisis Network funds the Republican Attorneys general. It funds the Republican Attorney general association and funds individual Republican Attorneys general and guess who the plaintiffs are in the Affordable Care act case . Republicans attorneys general. Trump joined them because he didnt want to defend. So hes in with the Republican Attorneys general. But heres the Judicial Crisis Network campaigning for the Supreme Court nominees, writing briefs for senators against the Affordable Care act, supporting the republicans who are bringing this case and leading this election process for this nominee. Heres the page off the brief. Heres where they are. Mitch mcconnell and on through the list. Senator collins, senator cornyn, senator hoven, who is still here . Marco rubio. Its a huge assortment of republican senators who Carrie Severino wrote a brief for against, against the Affordable Care act. So this is a, to me, pretty big deal. Ive never seen this around any court that ive ever been involved with where theres this much dark money and this much influence being used. Heres how the Washington Post summed it up. This is a conservative activist behind the Scenes Campaign to remake the nations courts. And its a 250 million dark money operation. 250 million is a lot of money to spend if you arent getting anything for it. So that raises the question. What are they getting for it . Well, i showed the slide earlier on the Affordable Care act. And on obergefell and on roe vs. Wade. Thats where they lost. But with another judge, that could change. Thats where the contest is. Thats where the Republican Party platform tells us to look at how they want judges to rule to reverse roe, to reverse the obamacare cases and to reverse obergefell and take away gay marriage. That is their stated objective and plan. Why not take them at their word . But theres another piece of it. And that is not whats ahead of us but whats behind us. Whats behind us is now 80 cases, mr. Chairman. 80 cases under chief Justice Roberts that have these characteristics. One, they were decided 54 by a bare majority. Two, the 54 majority was partisan in the sense that not one democratic appointee joined the five. I refer to that group as the roberts five. It changes a little bit as with Justice Scalias death for instance, but theres been a steady roberts five that has delivered now 80 of these decisions. And the last characteristic of them is that theres an identifiable republican donor interest in those cases. And in every single case that donor interest won. It was an 800, 54 partisan rout. Ransacking. And its important to look at where those cases went because theyre not about big public issues like getting rid of the Affordable Care act, undoing roe vs. Wade and undoing samesex marriage. They are about power. And if you look at those 80 decisions, they fall into four categories over and over and over again. One, unlimited and dark money in politics. Citizens united is the famous one, but its continued since with mccutchen and one coming up now. Always the 5 for Unlimited Money politics, never protecting against dark money in politics despite the fact they said it was going to be transparent. And who wins when you allow unlimited dark money in politics . A very small group. The ones who have Unlimited Money to spend and a motive to spend it in politics. They win. Everybody else loses. And if you are looking at who might be behind this, lets talk about people with Unlimited Money to spend and a motive to do it. Well see how that goes. Next, knock the civil jury down. Whittle it down to a nub. The civil jury was in the constitution, in the bill of rights, in our darn declaration of independence. But its annoying to big Corporate Powers because you can swagger your way as a big Corporate Power through congress. You can go and tell the president you put money into to elect, what to do. Hell put your stooges at the epa. Its all great until you get to the civil jury because they have an obligation, as you know, judge barrett. They have an obligation under the law to be fair to both parties irrespective of their size. You cant bribe them. Its a crime to tapper with the jury. Its Standard Practice to tamper with congress. And they make decisions based on the law. If you are used to being the boss, and swaggering your way around the political side, you dont want to be answerable before a jury. And so one after another these 85 to 4 decisions have knocked down, whittled away at the civil jury. A Great American institution. Third, first was unlimited dark money. Second was demean and diminish the civil jury. Third is, weaken regulatory agencies. A lot of this money im convinced is polluter money. The Koch Industries is a polluter. The fossil fuel industries is a polluter. Who else would be putting buckets of money into this and wanting to hide who they are behind donors trust or other schemes. And what if you are a big polluter, what do you isnt you want weak regulatory agencies. You want ones you can box up and run over to congress and get your friends to fix things for you in congress. Over and over and over again, these decisions are targeted at regulatory agencies to weaken their independent and weaken their strength. And if you are a big polluter, a weak Regulatory Agency is your idea of a good day. And the last thing is in politics. In voting. Why on earth the court made the decision, a factual decision, not something Appellate Courts are ordinarily supposed to make, as i understand it, judge barrett, the factual decision that Nobody Needed to worry about minority voters in preclearance states being discriminated against or that legislators would try to knock back their ability to vote. These five made that finding in Shelby County against Bipartisan Legislation from both houses of congress, hugely passed on no factual record. They just decided that that was a problem that was over. On no record with no basis because it got them to the result that we then saw. What followed . State after state after state passed Voter Suppression laws. One so badly targeting africanamericans that two courts said it was surgically surgically tailored to get after minority voters. And jerrymandering, the other great control. You go into a state like the red state project did and you pack democrats so tightly into a few districts that all the others become republican majority districts. You send a delegation to congress that has a huge majority of republican members like 13 to 5, as i recall, in a state where the five, the party of the five won the popular vote. You sent a delegation to congress thats out of step with the popular vote of that state, and court after court figured out how to solve that and the Supreme Court said, nope. 54 again. Nope, were not going to take an interest in that question. In all these areas where its about political power for big special interests and people who want to fund campaigns and people who want to get their way through politics without actually showing up, doing it behind donors trust and other groups, doing it through these schemes, over and over and over again, you see the same thing. 80 decisions, judge barrett. 80 decisions. And 800 sweep. I dont think youve tried cases but some cases, the issue is bias and discrimination. And if you are making a bias case, as a trial lawyer, Lindsey Graham is a hell of a good trial lawyer. If he wanted to make a bias case. Dick durbin is a hell of a good trial lawyer. If they wanted to show an 800 pattern, a, thats admissible and, b, id love to make that argument to the jury. Id be really hardpressed to be the lawyer saying, no, 800 is just a bunch of flukes. All 54. All partisan. All this way. So something is not right around the court. And dark money has a lot to do with it. Special interests have a lot to do with it. Donors trust and whoever is hiding behind donors trust has a lot to do with it. And the Bradley Foundation orchestrating it over the court has a lot to do with it. Thank you judge barrett, for listening to me a second time. And i think this gives you and i an opportunity to tee up an interesting conversation tomorrow. Thank you senator whitehouse. Senator cruz. Mr. Chairman, can i put three letters in with unanimous consent. Without objection. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Judge barrett, welcome. Congratulations on being nominated. Congratulations on enduring the confirmation proceedings. And i think its a particularly good thing. Weve made it through what youd call the top of the lineup of the questioning. And some of the smartest and most effective questioners on the democratic side. And i think it speaks volumes that collectively, they have had very few questions for you. And virtually none calling into question your credentials which are impeccable. Your record and whats been an extraordinary life that youve led. So that should be the source of great satisfaction in terms of the scholarly record and judicial record youve spent a lifetime building. I want to start by asking you a question. Why is the First Amendments protection of religious liberty. Why is that important . I think its broadly viewed that the framers protected and ratifiers protected the free exercise of religion because, you know, for reasons that we all know from history of persecuted religious minorities fleeing to the United States that enshrining that protection, you know, it was one of the bill of rights because it was considered so fundamental. And why why does that matter to americans . What different does that make in anybodys life . Well, i think all of the bill of rights, each and every one of them, is important to americans because we value the constitution. Including religious liberty. How about the free speech protections of the First Amendment . Why are those important . So that minority viewpoints cant be squashed. So that its not just the majority that can speak popular views. You know, you dont really need the First Amendment if what youre saying is something that everybody wants to hear. You need it when people are trying to silence you. And how about the Second Amendment . Why is the right to keep and bear arms important . Well, you know, we talked about heller earlier this morning. And what heller tells susthat the Second Amendment protects an individual right to bear arms for selfdefense. The bill of rights is incredibly important to americans. I also think what is really striking about this hearing today and also yesterday is that Senate Democrats are not defending what i think is really a radical agenda that they have when it comes to the bill of rights. And the topics they are discussing today have little bearing to the rights that are really at issue and in jeopardy of the Supreme Court. And so lets take a few minutes to go through them. First of all, weve had some discussion of roe vs. Wade. You have declined to give an opinion on a matter that might be pending before the court. That is of course, the same answer that every single sitting justice has given when he or she was sitting in the same chair you are. It is mandated by the judicial canons of ethics whether one is a nominee of the democratic president or republican president , that has been the answer that has been given to this committee for decades. But i do think it is interesting that our democratic colleagues, number one, dont discuss what would actually happen if there came a day in which roe vs. Wade was overruled. Which is namely that it would not suddenly become the case that abortion was illegal, but rather it would revert to the status of the law as its been for nearly 200 years of our nations history, which is that the question of the permissibility of abortion is a question for elected legislatures at the state levels and at the federal level. And it is difficult to dispute that there are great many jurisdictions, including jurisdictions like california and new york, who even if roe vs. Wade were no longer the law of the land, their elected legislatures would almost certainly continue unrestricted access to abortion with virtually no limitations. What i find interesting, though, is that our democratic colleagues do not discuss what is really the radical position of the most liberal justices on the Supreme Court, which is that no restrictions whatsoever are permissible when it comes to abortion. Yesterday one of the Democratic Senators made reference to the case gonzalez versus carhart. Im quite familiar with that case, and i represented texas in a number of other states as amici in that case. That case concerned the constitutionality of the federal ban on partial birth abortion. That was legislation that was signed into law that made the really gruesome practice of partial birth abortion illegal. Overwhelming majority of americans believe partial birth abortion should be prohibited, even those who identify as prochoice. A significant percentage of americans dont want to see that gruesome practice allowed. Supreme court by a vote of 54 in carhart versus gonzalez upheld the federal ban to partial birth abortion. There were four justices ready to strike it down. Ready to conclude that you cant ban partial birth abortion. That you cant ban lateterm abortion. And by the way, other restrictions that are at question include parental consent laws, parental notification laws. None of our democratic colleagues want to talk about the justices they want to see on the court would strike down every reasonable restriction on unlimited abortion on demand that the vast majority of americans support. How about free speech . The senator from rhode island just gave a long presentation, complete with lots of charts. Ill say a couple of things on free speech. First of all, our democratic colleagues, when they address the issue of socalled dark money and Campaign Finance contributions are often deeply, deeply hypocritical and dont address the actual facts that exist. Here are some facts. Of the top 20 organizations spending money for political speech in 2016, 14 of them gave virtually all of their money to democrats. And another three split their money evenly. So only three of the top 20 gave money to republicans. What did that mean in practice . That meant the top 20 superpac donors contributed 422 million to democrats and 189 million to republicans. Those who give these impassioned speeches against dark money dont mention that their side is funded by dark money with a massive differential. The senator from rhode island talked about big Corporate Powers. Without acknowledging that the contributions from the fortune 500 in this president ial election overwhelmingly favor joe biden and the democrats. Without acknowledging the contributions from wall street in this election overwhelmingly favor joe biden and the democrats. Its an awful lot of rhetoric about power. But it gets even more interesting when you look at Supreme Court nominations. We just heard an attack on the Federalist Society. A group that ive been a member of for over 25 years. I joined as a law student. Its a group that brings conservatives, libertarians, constitutionalists together to have robust discussions about the constitution and about the law. Whats interesting is nowhere in the senator of Rhode Islands remarks was any reference to a Company Called arabella advisers which is a forprofit entity that manages nonprofits, including the 1630 fund and the new vent are fund. What are those . Those sound like awfully dark and confusing names. Well, according to the wall street journal, this sunday, in the year 2017 and 2018, those entities reported 987. 5 million in revenue. Thats nearly a billion dollars. We heard a lot of thundering indignation at what was described as 250 million of expenditures. In this case youve got a billion dollars. The senator of rhode island said with that much money, much of which is dark money that we dont know who contributed it, he asked, what are they getting for it . And by the way, one of the things they are getting for it is a group called demand justice. A project of those entities. Spent 5 million opposing Justice Brett kavanaugh and has Just Launched a sevenfigure ad buy opposing your confirmation. So all of the great umbrage about the corporate interest or spending dark money is wildly in conflict with the actual facts that the corporate interests that are spending dark money are funding the democrats. By a factor of 3 to 1 or greater. A fact that doesnt ever seem to be acknowledged. But not only that, what was Citizens United about . Its interesting. Most people at home, theyve heard about Citizens United. They know it makes democrats very, very upset. But they dont actually know what the case is about. Citizens united concerned whether or not it was legal to make a movie criticizing a politician. Specifically, Citizens United is a Small Nonprofit Organization based here in d. C. That made a movie that was critical of Hillary Clinton. And the Obama Justice Department Took the position that it could fine it could punish Citizens United for daring to make a movie critical of a politician. The case went all the way to the u. S. Supreme court. At the oral argument, there was a moment that was truly chilling. Justice sam alito asked the Obama Justice department, is it your position, under your theory of the case, that the federal government can ban books . And the Obama Justice department responded, yes. Yes, it is our position that if the books criticize a political candidate, a politician, the federal government can ban books. As far as im concerned, that is a terrifying view of the First Amendment. Citizens united was decided 54. By a narrow 54 majority, the Supreme Court concluded the First Amendment did not allow the federal government to punish you for making a movie critical of a politician. And likewise, that the federal government couldnt ban books. Four justices dissent. Four justices were willing to say the federal government can ban books and can ban movies and presumably could ban books as well. When Hillary Clinton was running for president , she explicitly promised every justice she nominated to the court would pledge to overturn Citizens United. By the way, Hillary Clinton said she would demand of her nominee something you have rightly said that this administration is not demanded of you which is a commitment on any case as to how you will rule. Democrats have shown no compunction in expecting their nominees to make a promise, heres how im going to vote on a pending case, judicial ethics be damned. Or how about the Second Amendment . Weve heard some reference to the heller decision. The senator from connecticut yesterday talked about reasonable gun control and gun safety provisions. Well, that, of course, was not what was at stake in the heller decision. The majority decision in heller. Justice scalias opinion. Acknowledge acknowledges reasonable provisions. Fe your opinion acknowledged that restrictions banning dangerous criminals from receiving firearms are entirely permissible under the Second Amendment. But the issue at heller was much more fundamental. It was whether the Second Amendment protects an individual right to keep and bear arms at a all. The vote in heller was 54. By a vote of 54, the majority struck down the district of columbias total prohibitions on owning an operative firearm in the district of columbia. The argument of the four dissenters was not what our democratic colleagues talk about here. It wasnt some reasonable gun control provisions are okay. That was not the argument of the dissenters. That question, we can actually have a reasonable debate on reasonable minds can differ on what the appropriate lines should be. What are reasonable laws there. Thats not what was at issue in heller. The position was the Second Amendment protects no individual right to keep and bear arms whatsoever. But merely a, quote, collective right of the militia, which is fancy lawyer talk for a nonexistent right. Four justices would have ruled that way. One vote away. The consequences of the court concluding that there is no individual right under the First Amendment would mean you and i and every american watching this would lose your Second Amendment right. It would mean the federal government, the state government, the city could ban guns entirely. Could make it a criminal offense for any one of us to own a firearm and no individual american would have any judicial right to challenge that. That is a radical reading of the constitution. That is effectively erasing the Second Amendment from the bill of rights. And Hillary Clinton, likewise, promised in 2016 that every judge she nominated would commit to voting to overturn heller. They were big on litmus tests. And joe biden, although he refuses to answer just about anything, about whether or not hes going to pack the court. He did tell the American People the voters dont deserve to know whether hes going to pack the cou court. Truly a statement of disrespect and contempt for the voters. Unusual in our political process. One vote away from the Second Amendment being erased from the bill of rights. None of our democratic colleagues admit that that is their agenda, and yet, those are the justices that democratic president ial nominees are promising they will appoint. Justices who will take away your right to criticize politicians. Justices who will allow censorship. Justices who will allow movies and books to be banned. Justices who will erase the Second Amendment from the bill of rights. And how about religious liberty . Religious liberty is an issue near and dear to a great many of us. The right of every american to live according to your faith, according to your conscience. Whatever that faith may be. Religious liberty is fundamentally about diversity. Its about respecting diversity that whatever your faith tradition might be, the government is not going to trample on it. Religious liberty cases over and over have been decided 54. Ed orton versus perry dealt with the Ten Commandments monument on the state house grounds. An individual plaintiff, an atheist, a homeless man filed a lawsuit to tear down the Ten Commandments. It was decided 54. Four justices were willing to say in effect, send in the bulldozers and tear down that monument because you cant gaze on the image of the Ten Commandments on public land. Another case, the Mojave Desert Veterans Memorial. This was a memorial erected to the men and women who gave their lives in world war i. Its a lone white latin cross, simple and bare in the middle of the desert. Ive been there. The aclu filed a lawsuit saying you cannot gaze on the image of a cross on public land. And the aclu won in the district court. They won in the 9th Circuit Court of appeals. The federal Court Ordered that Veterans Memorial to be covered up with a burlap sack with a chain on the bottom, and then a plywood box. When the case went to the Supreme Court, i represented 3 million veterans pro bono, for free, defending that Veterans Memorial. We won 54. And there were four justices prepared to say tear down the Veterans Memorial. And under the reasoning that they put forth, they were not far away from saying bring out the chisels and remove the crosses and the stars of david on the tombstones of the men and women that gave their lives at Arlington Cemetery defending this nation. That is a radical view. And were one vote away. That is utterly contrary to the text of the the First Amendment, to the understanding of the First Amendment. When we argue the Ten Commandments case in the u. S. Supreme court, there was more than a little bit of irony. And do you know how many times the image of the Ten Commandments appears in the courtroom of the Supreme Court . The answer to that is 43. There are two images of the Ten Commandments carved on the wooden doors as you walk out of the courtroom. Youll soon be sitting looking at them. There are 40 images of the Ten Commandments on the bronze gates on the both sides of the courtroom. And then judge barrett, when youre sitting at the bench, above your Left Shoulder will be a phrase you know well. A phrase carved into the wall, a great law givers, one of whom is moses. He is standing there holding the Ten Commandments. The text of which is legible in hebrew as he looks down upon the justices and four justices were willing to say in effect, bring out the sand blasters because we must remove god from the public square. That is a profound threat to our religious liberty and id note it doesnt just extend to public acknowledgments. It also extends to religious liberty. The Little Sisters of the poor. A catholic convent of nuns who take oaths of poverty who devote their lives to caring for the sick. Caring for the needy. Caring for the elderly. And the Obama Administration litigated against the Little Sisters of the poor seeking to fine them in order to force them to pay for abortioninducing drugs, among others. Its truly a stunning situation when you have the federal government litigating against nuns. Supreme court decided the hobby lobby case, another case routinely denounced by Senate Democrats. It concluded the federal government could not permissibly force a christian business to violate their faith. It reflected the religious liberty traditions of our country that you can live according to your faith without the government trampling on it. You doe knknow what this body d . Senate democrats introduced legislation to gut the religious freedom restoration act. When it passed this body, it passed with an overwhelming bipartisan majority. Senate democrats all voted for the religious freedom restoration act. Democratic president bill clinton signed the religious freedom restoration act. Yet this body voted on legislation to just gut the protections for religious liberty, and im sorry to say every single Senate Democrat voted to do so. Not a single one, zero, would defend religious liberty. Joe biden has already pledged if hes elected he plans to initiate again the attack on the Little Sisters of the poor. Its interesting. Folks in the press like to talk about pope francis. And on some issues, pope francis has been vocal when it comes to the environment, when it comes to issues concerning immigration. The pope has been vocal on issues our democratic colleagues like and agree with. The press is happy to amplify those views. Somehow missing from that amplification is acknowledgment that when the pope came to the United States in washington, he went and visited the Little Sisters of the poor. Here in d. C. , he went to their home here in d. C. In the vatican and explained, he did so because he wanted to highlight their cause. That the federal government shouldnt be persecuting nuns for living according to their faith. Thats whats at stake in these nominations. And you wont hear any of that from the Senate Democrats on this committee. Thats why their base is so angry at your nomination, judge barrett, because they dont believe you are going to join the radical efforts to erase those fundamental rights from the bill of rights. I believe that issue, preserving the constitution, preserving the bill of rights, our fundamental liberties, i believe is the most important issue facing the country in the november elections. And i think for those of us who value those rights, we should take solace in the fact that not a single democrat is willing even to acknowledge the radical sweep of their agenda, much less defend it. They know its wildly unpopular, and, look, right at the heart of this is a decision Many Democrats have made to abandon democracy. You see, most policies, policies like obamacare, policies like health care, most policies under our constitutional system are meant to be decided by democratically elected legislatures. Why . So they can be accountable to the people. So if the voters disagree, they can throw the bums out. But too Many Democrats have decided today that democracy is too complicated. Its too hard to actually convince your fellow americans of the merits of your position. Its much easier just to give it to the courts. Find five lawyers in black robes and let them decree the policy outcome you want which makes your radical base happy, presumably makes the millions if not billions in dark money being spent for democrats happy without actually having to justify it to the American People. Judge barrett, im not going to ask you to respond to any of that. But i do want to shift to a different topic. Which is a bit more about you personally, your background. Judge barrett, do you speak any Foreign Languages . Once upon a time, i could speak french, but i have fallen woefully out of practice so please dont ask me to do that right now. You can be assured of that because my i had two years of high school french, and i suspect yours remains much better than mine. How about music . Do you play any instruments . The piano. Do you . How long have you played the piano . I played the piano growing up for ten years, and now most of my piano playing consists of playing my childrens songs for them and supervising their own piano practice. I look forward one day when i have more time to be able to choose some of my own music. Now do the kids do piano lessons as well . The kids do piano lessons. Some of the older ones in high school have gotten so busy with smo sports that theyve stopped. Our girls are 9 and 12 and they both do piano lessons. Ill say at least nour household, it is less than voluntary. One of the things heidi and i found, particularly the last six months during covid, which has been an extraordinary crisis, is just with two kids at home that doing Distance Learning when schools were shut down was really hard for us with two children. For you and your husband, you have got seven kids. How did how did you all manage through the lockdowns and Distance Learning . What was that like in the barrett household . It was a challenging time as it was for every american. Our oldest daughter emma, who is in college, moved home at that point because she was at notre dame. It closed. Emma could manage her own elearning and our High School Age children tess and vivian could, too. Jesse and i tried to take a divide and conquer approach for the younger four. It was quite challenging. I assure you. One part of your story that i find particularly remarkable, and that i admire, is the decision you made to adopt two children. You and your husband had five biological children. You adopted two more. Both of your adopted children are from haiti. Haiti is a country that has some of the most crushing poverty in the world. My brotherinlaw is a missionary in haiti. And actually heidi and the girls just got back from haiti a couple of weeks ago. I was curious if you would share with this committee and with the American People what led you and your husband to make the decision to adopt . Its, i think, one of the most loving and compassionate decisions any family can make. When jesse and i were engaged, we met another couple who had adopted in this instance it was a couple who adopted a child with special needs. And then we also met another couple who adopted a few children internationally, and we decided at that point, while we were engaged, that at some point in the future, we wanted to do that ourselves. And i guess we had imagined initially that we would have whatever biological kids that we had decided to have and then adopt at the end, but after we had our first daughter emma, we thought, why wait . So we i was expecting tess when we went and got vivian. So she and tess function, we call them our fraternal twins. Theyre in the same grade. Its really enriched our family immeasurably. And once we had adopted vivian, at that point, then we made the decision we definitely wanted to adopt again. And so several years later, john peter entered our family. So your children have been wonderfully well behaved. I think you are an amazing role model for little girls. What advice would you give little girls . Well, what i am saying is not designed my brother now has left so thinking what my dad told me, about anything boys can do, girls can do. Boys are great, too. Thank you. Thank you. Senator klobuchar. Thank you, mr. Chair. Welcome again, judge. Since i have the draw to always follow senator cruz, i did want to make one thing clear after listening to that for a half hour that joe biden is catholic, and he is a man of faith. And then i want to turn to Something Else, and that is that we need a reset here, in my mind, for the people at home. A bit of a reality check that this isnt normal right now. We have to understand that what people are dealing with, that 7. 7 Million People have gotten this virus, that 214,000 americans have died, and for people watching at home and wondering what were all doing in this room right now and maybe youre home because you lost your job or maybe you got your kids crawling all over your couch right now. Maybe youre trying to teach your first grader how to do a mute button to go to school. Or maybe youve got a Small Business that you had to close down or that is struggling. We should be doing Something Else right now. We shouldnt be doing this. We should be passing Coronavirus Relief like the house just did, which was a significant bill that would have been a big help and i think people have to know that right now. Whether youre democrat, independent or republican. And thats why i started out yesterday by telling people that they need to vote. Number two, some of my colleagues throughout this hearing on the other side have been kind of portraying the job that the judge is before us on as being some kind of ivory tower exercise. I think one of my friends called it related that youd be dealing with the dormant commerce clause. Im sure that might be true, but we also know that this is the highest court in the land. That the decisions of this court have a real impact on people. And i appreciate it, judge, that you said you didnt want to be a queen. I actually wouldnt mind being a queen around here, truth be known. I wouldnt mind doing it. A benevolent queen on making decisions so we could get things done. But you said you wouldnt let your views influence you to and the like. But the Supreme Court rulings, they rule peoples lives. They decide if people can get married. They decide what schools they can go to. They decide if they could even have access to contraception. All of these things matter. So i want to make that clear. And the third reset here that i think we need to have is that this hearing is not normal. It is a sham. It is a rush to put in a justice. The last time that we had a vacancy so close to an election was when Abraham Lincoln was president. And he made the wise decision to wait until after the election. The last time we lost a justice so close to an election. Thats what he did. Today we are 21 days from the election. People are voting. Millions of people have already cast their ballots. And i go to the words of senator mcconnell last time we had a situation in an election year. He said, the American People should have a voice in the selection of their next Supreme Court justice. Therefore, this vacancy should not be filled until we have a n. That set the precedent that so many of you have embraced. Or at least you did a few years ago and thats the People Choose the president and the president nominate it is justice. Why is this happening . Thats a good question. This guy our president , hes a one that decided to plop a Supreme Court nomination in the middle of an election. When Peoples Health care is on the line with a case before the court on november 10th. So lets see what he said about the Supreme Court. One of president Trumps Campaign promises in 2015 was that his judicial appointments will do the right thing on obamacare. You can see it right here. And in fact, judge, just one day after you were nominated, this is like a few weeks ago, he said also on twitter that it would be a big win if the Supreme Court strikes down the health law. So, judge, my first question, do you think we should take the president at his word when he says hi nominee will do the right thing and overturn the Affordable Care act . Senator klobuchar, i cant really speak to what the president has said on twitter. He hasnt said any of that to me and what i can tell you as i have told your colleagues earlier today is that no one has elicited from me any commitment in a case or brought up a commitment in a case. Im 100 committed to Judicial Independence from political pressure so whatever Peoples Party platforms may be or Campaign Promises may be, the reason why judges have life tenure is to insulate them from those pressures so i take my oath seriously to follow the law and, you know, i have not precommitted nor would i precommit to decide a case any particular way. I think this idea that you have a job for life makes this even more important for us to consider where you might be. I know you have not said how you would rule on this case thats coming up right after the election where the president had said it would be a big win if the Supreme Court strikes down the law but you have directly criticized Justice Roberts in an article in my own state in one of the Minnesota Law School journals. It was in 2017, same year you became a judge and when roberts writes the opinion to uphold the affordable c Affordable Care act you said he quote pushed the Affordable Care act beyond the plausible meaning to save the statute. Is that correct . I just want to clarify, is this the constitutional commentary publication that we discussed . Yes, it is. But it is still a university of minnesota law. Okay. Just wanted to be sure because i had published did you say that, that he pushed the Affordable Care act beyond the plausible meaning to save the statutesome. You said that i criticized, you know, chief Justice Roberts and i dont attack people, just ideas. That was designed to make a comment about his reasoning in that case which i have as i said is consistent with the way that the majority opinion characterized it as a less plausible reading of the statute. You didnt agree with his reasoning that upheld the Affordable Care act. King versus that was nifb versus sebelius. What i said with respect to that the interpretation that the majority adopted construing the mandate to be a tax rather than a. Is not the most natural reading of the statute. But the reading that Justice Roberts got to. You criticized another case where the court ruled in favor of the health law. This was in a 2015 National Public radio interview and acknowledged the result of people being able to keep their subsidies was would help millions of americans, yet you praised the dissent by Justice Scalia saying it had quote the better of the legal argument. Is that correct . I did say that, yes. Okay. So then would you have ruled the same way and voted with Justice Scalia . Senator klobuchar, one o. Plus sides or up sides of being an academic is that you can speak for yourself. The professor professes and can 0pine and very different than the judicial process making and difficult to say how i would have decided that case if i had to go through the whole process that i was describing this morning. Now having been a judge for three years i can say i appreciate greatly the distinctions between academic writing or academic spooking and judicial Decision Making such that a judge might look at an academic and say easy for you to say because you are not on a multimember court, not constrained, you dont have real parties in front of you consulting with litigants and clerks. Got it. It is a different process. I viewed that one so interestingly because you were so commenting on the Public Policy result which you and my colleagues on the republican side have said this shouldnt be about Public Policy and you said, okay, thats okay but then you were really clear on the legal outcome in terms of your view of whose side you were on. You were on scalias side and that was a side to not uphold the Affordable Care act which would have been kicked millions of people off their health care in effect because they would have lost their subsidies and i see this as interesting because of this kind of dichotomy theyre trying to make between policy and legal and my view is that legal decisions affect policy. Im looking at people in my state that will deal with this if the Affordable Care act is struck down. Elijah born with cerebral palsy. He is 16 and a proud boy scout. Casey who has chronic kidney failure. Without the aca that would be that. Or internet from the suburbs whose daughter has multiple sclerosis depends on the benefits of the aca. Lilliana with a 21yearold son with autism and needs the children to be able to stay on her insurance until she is 26. Melanie, a senior of duluth, treated for Ovarian Cancer and needs access to the Affordable Care act. My point is that these are real world situations and so i get that you are not saying how you would rule on these cases so what does that leave us with here to try to figure out what kind of judge you would be . And i was thinking last night of when i was growing up we would go up to northern minnesota and we didnt have a cabin but we had friends that did and we would go on these walks in the woods with my mom and she loved to show all the tracks on that path. Whether they were deer tracks and she would have us figure out what they were or elk or a bear. And we would follow these tracks down that path and youd always think is there a deer around the corner to see. Very rarely was there one but we would follow the tracks and so when i look at your record i just keep following the tracks. Thats what ive got to do and when i follow the tracks this is what i see. You consider Justice Scalia one of the most conservative judges in the history of the Supreme Court as your mentor. You criticized the decision written by Justice Roberts upholding the Affordable Care act, that is to me one big track. Even if you didnt consider yourself criticizing him personally but criticized the reasoning. You then said in another case about the Affordable Care act that you would that you liked the legal reasoning that he had the better legal argument, that Justice Scalia had the better legal argument. You have signed your name to a Public Statement featured in an ad, a paid ad that called for an end to what it called the ad called the barbaric legacy of roe v. Wade which ran on the anniversary of the 1973 Supreme Court decision. You disagreed with longstanding precedent on gun safety which said that felons shouldnt be able to get guns, something pretty important to me when i had my old job in law enforcement. This is something that the senator durbin asked you about. You suggested that you agree with the dissent in the Marriage Equality case that it wasnt the role of the court to decide that samesex couples had the right to be married. I think this was in a lecture you gave where you said the dissents view is that it wasnt for the court to decide. That people could lobby in state legislatures. All this takes me to one point as i follow the tracks do unthe path and it takes me to this point where i believe and i think the American People have to understand that you would be the polar opposite of justice ginsburg. She and Justice Scalia were friends, yes, but she never embraced his legal philosophy. So that is what concerns me and i want to turn to an area that where i think Justice Ginsburgs whose seat we are considering you for a hero and that was the area of voting