Meet President Trump's Supreme Court Nominee: Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh!

Congratulations and good luck to this worthy nominee!

Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh (screenshot via YouTube)

Congratulations to Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh, selected by President Donald J. Trump to fill the U.S. Supreme Court seat vacated by Justice Anthony M. Kennedy. Judge Kavanaugh is President Trump’s second SCOTUS pick after Justice Neil M. Gorsuch, and if confirmed to the Court, Kavanaugh will likely move it in a more conservative direction.

The selection of Judge Kavanaugh — a deeply respected, long-serving judge of the D.C. Circuit, the second most important court in the country after the Supreme Court — makes perfect sense. Here’s what I tweeted a few hours after Justice Kennedy’s SCOTUS retirement announcement (apologies for the typo, “clerks” should be “clerk”):

Judge Kavanaugh, 53, has authored more than 300 opinions during his 12 years on the D.C. Circuit — which will, together with his work as a lawyer before taking the bench, provide some grist for the opposition mill. He worked for Ken Starr on the Whitewater/Monica Lewinsky investigation, and he served in the Bush White House, in the counsel’s office and as White House Staff Secretary. He will get tough questions from senators about his work as both a lawyer and a judge.

But in the end, Judge Kavanaugh should be confirmed. Some senators, such as Rand Paul and Ted Cruz, expressed preferences for other candidates during the nominee selection process, but they will surely vote for Judge Kavanaugh in the end. I also expect the “swing” Republican senators, Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski, plus a few red-state Democrats, especially those up for reelection this fall, to support Judge Kavanaugh’s nomination.

Judge Kavanaugh has an impeccable résumé: Yale College, Yale Law School, a SCOTUS clerkship, government service (the Justice Department and White House), Biglaw practice (partnership at Kirkland & Ellis), and more than a dozen years of distinguished service on the D.C. Circuit. There are no objective or qualification-based reasons to oppose him. Judge Kavanaugh is not just brilliant but also extremely likable, and he will perform superbly at his hearings (even better than Justice Gorsuch, I predict).

Sponsored

President Trump delivered a solid announcement speech tonight, praising Judge Kavanaugh for his superb legal mind and longtime public service. Judge Kavanaugh delivered an excellent nomination acceptance speech, emphasizing all the right and traditional themes: family, service, and the rule of law. He thanked his parents, both lawyers — with a focus on his mother, a schoolteacher turned prosecutor turned judge — and his wife and daughters (exchanging an adorable high-five with one of them). He also sounded themes of diversity, such as the fact that a majority of his law clerks have been women, and bipartisanship, such as the fact that he was hired to teach at Harvard Law School by then-Dean Elena Kagan.

For more detailed discussion of Judge Kavanaugh, about whom we will hear so much in the days and weeks ahead — some of it true, some of it not — see my earlier story, The Supreme Court Nominee Search: The Case For Judge Kavanaugh.

Congratulations once again to Judge Kavanaugh, and good luck to him in the confirmation process that lies ahead. Given our polarized times, it won’t be pretty — but as I wrote in making the case for Judge Kavanaugh as nominee, despite a longer paper trail that could make for a more challenging process, some fights are worth having.

Earlier: The Supreme Court Nominee Search: The Case For Judge Kavanaugh


Sponsored

DBL square headshotDavid Lat is editor at large and founding editor of Above the Law, as well as the author of Supreme Ambitions: A Novel. He previously worked as a federal prosecutor in Newark, New Jersey; a litigation associate at Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz; and a law clerk to Judge Diarmuid F. O’Scannlain of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. You can connect with David on Twitter (@DavidLat), LinkedIn, and Facebook, and you can reach him by email at dlat@abovethelaw.com.