Monday was the first day of Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson’s Supreme Court confirmation hearings and she’s expected to be grilled by Republican lawmakers on her record. With that on their minds, CNN journalists and analysts on At This Hour rushed to defend Jackson from accusations that she’s lenient with sex offenders and child porn peddlers given some of her rulings. They even lashed out at Senator Josh Hawley (R-MO), calling his scrutiny on her record “extreme” and “toxic.”
“And [Senator] Dick Durbin [D-IL] already alluded to this when he said earlier, ‘these baseless charges aren't fair,” host Kate Bolduan proclaimed before she even addressed what the charges were. “Durbin's likely specifically talking about some of what's been lined up as a line of attack coming from Republicans like Senator Josh Hawley.”
After playing a short clip of Hawley on Fox News speaking about the allegations, Bolduan asserted, without evidence, that “his assessment’s been fact-checked, found to lack significant content at the very least.”
On Twitter, Hawley’s press secretary, Abigail Marone addressed the “fact checks” by pointing out how they “admit @HawleyMO is technically correct but then argue that sentencing guidelines for pedophiles are too harsh and they should be more lenient. Gross.” She also provided four screenshots proving her point.
“Well, I have no doubt that she'll respond well to something that is as disingenuous as that statement. What's the reality here is they're trying to throw everything against the wall hoping it will stick,” scoffed senior legal analyst Laura Coates.
Moments later, Coates defended Jackson’s history as a public defender (without mentioning her time as a private defender) to argue that she’s “not soft on crime” but rather “hard on injustice” and declared “That's where a judge should actually be.”
Up next was chief political analyst Gloria Borger who discounted Senator Chuck Grassley’s (R-IA) comments about how this wasn’t going to be like the confirmation of Justice Brett Kavanaugh. “They are people who want to say that the Biden administration in nominating her has shown that it is soft on crime. This is something that works very well for Republicans,” she huffed noting that some on the committee have presidential aspirations.
Borger went on to denounce Hawley as being “extreme” and “toxic” to scrutinize Jackson’s record like that. Again, without evidence, she suggested that her alleged lenient sentencing for sex offenders “if you look at the numbers, is also not true.”
“So I think, you know, we ought to listen to these hearings and we ought to hear what kind of a judge Ketanji Brown Jackson really is, rather than listening to politicians make their political points which, of course, they always do in these hearings,” she lectured.
At least she gave a tacit admission that what the Democrats and the media did to Kavanaugh was just for political gain.
CNN’s defense of Judge Jackson and dismissal of serious questions about her record were made possible because of lucrative sponsorships from Expedia and Vroom. Their contact information is linked.
The transcript is below, click "expand" to read:
CNN’s At this Hour
March 21, 2022
11:36:44 a.m. EasternKATE BOLDUAN: Let's get to some of what the Judge is going to face in terms of questioning. I want to play for everyone what's going to come at her. And Dick Durbin already alluded to this when he said earlier, “these baseless charges aren't fair.” Durbin's likely specifically talking about some of what's been lined up as a line of attack coming from Republicans like Senator Josh Hawley. And Hawley was on Fox News earlier today kind of laying out where he's headed. Let me play this.
[Cuts to video]
SEN. JOSH HAWLEY (R-MO): While she has been on the bench, Judge Jackson in every case in which she's had a child porn offender in front of her, she's given that person a lenient sentence lower than what the federal guidelines recommend, lower than what prosecutors from the government sought. [Transition] But this is somebody, I think, who has a lot of issues when it comes to being lenient with criminals, soft on crime and I want to know, is this a person who's going to protect our kids or who is going to protect child sex predators and we need to get those answers.
[Cuts back to live]
BOLDUAN: And Laura, his assessment’s been fact-checked, found to lack significant content at the very least. But this is what the judge is going to face in terms of some of the questioning that is going to come at her. How does she respond?
LAURA COATES: Well, I have no doubt that she'll respond well to something that is as disingenuous as that statement. What's the reality here is they're trying to throw everything against the wall hoping it will stick.
(…)
11:38:15 a.m. Eastern
Number one, public defenders, and trust me, I've been a federal prosecutor. We did not view them as enemies because they were somehow soft on crime. We didn't view them as enemies at all. They were part of a symbiotic relationship to try to ensure that injustice would not occur. They are not soft on crime, they are hard on injustice. That's where a judge should actually be.
(…)
11:40:20 a.m. Eastern
GLORIA BORGER: They are people who want to say that the Biden administration in nominating her has shown that it is soft on crime. This is something that works very well for Republicans. And what Hawley is trying to do in the extreme, in my opinion, in a toxic way, in my opinion, is to say that, you know, she sentences these offenders, these potential sex offenders and sex offenders in a more lenient way than her fellow judges, which, if you look at the numbers, is also not true.
So, you know, they're trying to make political points against her, and one thing I think she can do as a judge is explain the context in which she said things and how some of the things that she said were actually cherry-picked in which she was repeating what the defendants were saying back to them.
So I think, you know, we ought to listen to these hearings and we ought to hear what kind of a judge Ketanji Brown Jackson really is, rather than listening to politicians make their political points which, of course, they always do in these hearings.
BOLDUAN: That’s exactly right.
(…)
