The first Black woman nominated to the U.S. Supreme Court, Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, on Tuesday, faced up to 11 hours of grilling on Day 2 of her four-day confirmation hearings before the Senate Judiciary Committee.
Jackson, 51, who currently sits on America’s second most powerful court, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, was questioned by each of the committee’s 11 Republicans and 11 Democrats over two days.
On Thursday, senators could ask questions of the American Bar Association and other outside witnesses.
While Democrats have the votes to confirm President Joe Biden’s first Supreme Court nominee on their own and hope to by the middle of April, the hearings could prove critical to the U.S. White House goal of securing at least some Republican support and shoring up the court’s credibility.
Child porn sentencing:
Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., spent his entire 30 minutes of questioning to again accuse Jackson of giving short sentences to child porn offenders, saying he questioned her judgment.
Hawley brought up a specific case involving an 18-year-old defendant who Jackson sentenced to three months in federal prison.
The government had requested 24 months in prison.
“I’m having a hard time wrapping my head around it,” Hawley said.
Adding: “We’re talking about 8-year-olds, 9-year-olds, 11-year-olds, and 12-year-olds [as victims]. He’s [the defendant] got images that added up to over 600 images, gobs of video footage. If it’s not heinous or egregious, how would you describe it?”
It’s not just about how much time a person spends in prison, it’s about understanding the harm of this behavior
Jackson responded, “The evidence that you are pointing to is heinous. It is egregious. What a judge has to do is determine how to sentence defendants proportionately, consistent with the elements that the statutes include with the requirements that Congress has set forward.
“Unwarranted sentencing disparities is something that the Sentencing Commission has been focused on for a long time in regard to child pornography offenses.
“All of the offenses are horrible. All of the offenses are egregious. But the guidelines, as you pointed out, are being departed from even with respect to the government’s recommendation.
“The government in this case and in others has asked for a sentence that is substantially less than the guideline penalty. And so what I was discussing was that phenomenon, that the guidelines in this area are not doing the work of differentiating defendants as the government itself indicated in this very case.
“And so that’s what I was talking about, but I want to assure you, Senator, that I take these cases very seriously. It’s not just about how much time a person spends in prison, it’s about understanding the harm of this behavior.
“It’s about all of the other kinds of restraints that sex offenders are ordered, rightly, to live under at the end of the day. The sentences in these cases include not only prison time, but restraints on computer use, sometimes for decades.
“Restraints on ability to go near children, sometimes for decades. All of these things judges consider in order to effect what Congress has required, which is a sentence that’s sufficient but not greater than necessary to promote the purposes of punishment.”
WATCH VIDEO:
Sen. John Kennedy asked Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson if she believes efforts to pack the Supreme Court delegitimize it, to which Jackson responded, "I feel so strongly about ensuring that judges remain out of political debates." https://t.co/Kc86zp8Smy pic.twitter.com/hTgJhEb25h
— ABC News Politics (@ABCPolitics) March 23, 2022