Reid: Gonzales Qualified for High Court
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James Joyner | Wednesday, July 6, 2005 |
Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid all but endorsed Attorney General Alberto Gonzales for the Supreme Cour this afternoon.
Reid: Gonzales Qualified for High Court (AP)
Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid on Wednesday pronounced Attorney General Alberto Gonzales qualified to sit on the Supreme Court, but added, “I don’t know if he’d have an easy way through” Senate confirmation.
Reid also chided conservatives for criticizing Gonzales while Bush was overseas. “I think it’s too bad the president has to respond in Denmark about statements from the far right,” he said. “People here have gone a little too far.”
Gonzales was confirmed as attorney general by a vote of 60-36 earlier this year as Republicans overrode Democratic critics who said he had helped formulate White House policies that led to torture of prisoners held overseas as part of the war on terror.
“Alberto Gonzales is qualified. He’s attorney general of the United States and a former Texas judge,” Reid said. “But having said that he’s qualified, I don’t know if he’d have an easy way through.”
While Gonzales would hardly by my dream Justice, he’s likely an improvement over O’Connor ideologically. It’s interesting that Reid has gone public with this well before a nomination is announced. Perhaps he figures that by signaling that the Democrats would support a candidate that the president seems to favor he can persuade Bush to avoid going for a Scalia-type conservative.
About the Author: James Joyner is the publisher of Outside the Beltway and the managing editor of the Atlantic Council. He's a former Army officer, Desert Storm vet, and college professor with a PhD in political science from The University of Alabama. He lives just outside the Beltway in Alexandria, Virginia with his wife and infant daughter.
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The President doesn't pick nominees solely on whether they're "qualified"; I don't see why the Senate should be limited to considering that sole factor. Checks & balances ...
That said, how someone who thinks the Youngstown case is simply irrelevant to executive wartime power, can even be said to be qualified to be a Supreme Court justice, is beyond me. But that was no bar to his becoming AG, it seems.
Is there some "reverse English" in this story? Daring the Pres to make an appointment against the grain of his more conservative supporters? Ya think?
I think he passes the non-litmus-test litmus test the Democrats have for supreme court nominees.
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