well, he certainly wants to do it fast, laura, but he doesn t need to do it as fast as mitch mcconnell did with amy coney barrett because there was a looming deadline of the election, which compelled the republicans to act fast. but chuck schumer is using that as a precedent to say we can move this very quickly. i think if they do it by the end of the supreme court term in june or july, that will allow justice breyer to serve out his term and then let the successor take his place. kevin makes a very good point about partisanship. i understand the reluctance of justice breyer to have the court perceived that way. sadly, that ship has sailed and the public views the court as a pretty partisan institution, for very good reason, because it acts as a partisan institution and the partisan machinery is going to gear up and it is going to give joe biden a nominee probably by the end of the spring. kevin, that do you think justice breyer s lasting legacy will be? i think, you know, his ju
and about his legacy at the court and i m sure doesn t want to be replaced by somebody who has dramatically different views about the law than he does. at the same time, i m sure it pains him that his retirement timing is going to be perceived as at least in part motivated by these political considerations. he more than hardly, more than any other justice, believes and wants the public to understand that the court is not a partisan political institution. and he thinks that the public s perception of it as a political institution undermines its legitimacy and he s been very concerned that this is undermining the comfourt s abil to play its role as the final interpreter of the constitution s protection for individual rights. john, we all remember how fast justice amy coney barrett got confirmed. do you think chuck schumer will be able to pull off the same deal here with whoever president biden picks to replace justice breyer?
33 minutes past the hour here in new york. senate democrats say they plan to move quickly to fill the seat of retiring supreme court justice stephen breyer. breyer is expected to confirm his retirement officially at a white house event with president biden later today. democrats are already preparing for obstruction from senate republicans. in the senate, we want to be deliberate. we want to move quickly. we want to get this done as soon as possible. some republicans on the other hand, some, are striking a different tone. as you know, i felt that the timetable for the last nominee was too compressed. this time there is no need for any rush. we can take our time, go through the process, which is very important one. it is a lifetime appointment after all. just take our time, after 30
unique on the court in that he isn t a strict texturalist, it is hard to pigeon hole his philosophy other than to say he cares deeply about how the court works as part of a broader government that is supposed to work for people. so he is deeply interested in the practical consequences of the court s decisions on how the government works, on how people s lives are improved, in a way that almost nobody left on the court is. he doesn t think you can define the meaning of a statute or the constitution just by staring deeply into the text. he wants to know how it is going to work in the real world and he cares about the opinions of others. expert agencies and the government, his colleagues, and even law clerks. he was very interested in talking through legal issues with just about anybody who would listen, because he just deeply loves the practice of being a judge. okay, kevin russell, thank you so much. john harwood, stay with us. a lot more to discuss. like the federal reserve, gearin
he needed this badly. look, this is something that is welcome to the white house, as justice breyer told our colleague joan bescoupic last year, he doesn t live on pluto. he understands the political process, he was getting a lot of heat, nobody wanted to repeat on the democratic side what happened with ruth bader ginsburg, who decided to stay, even though she was quite elderly. and ended up passing away during donald trump s term and as you just heard, in four weeks they republicans pushed through amy coney barrett, tilted court from 5-4 conservative court to a 6-3 conservative court. justice breyer is making sure, he s 83 years old, in good health, but you never know what s going to happen. he s now making sure that joe biden is going to be able to appoint someone who can be on that court for decades. it is welcome also for the white house in the sense that this is