Grilling Gorsuch and fearing the Federalist Society
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Jonathan Adler writes for the Volokh Conspiracy:
This week, Senate Democrats have poked and prodded Judge Neil Gorsuch in an effort to derail his confirmation to the U.S. Supreme Court. They’ve asked about his judicial opinions, his writings, his work for the George W. Bush administration, and even his dissertation adviser. Throughout it all, Gorsuch has been largely unflappable, revealing that he is precisely what all who know him already knew: He’s an intelligent and conscientious, mainstream conservative judge who cares deeply about the judicial craft.
Not content to let the Gorsuch nomination sail through, some have sought to suggest he’s unfit because of who nominated him or who supports him. Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), for one, spent time challenging Gorsuch to disavow the “dark money” supporting his confirmation. Others have expressed dismay that Gorsuch is a member of the Federalist Society and was recommended to the president by the Society’s executive vice president, Leonard Leo, who has taken a leave from the organization to work on the nomination.
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President, Center for Individual Rights
Todd Gaziano is the President of the Center for Individual Rights. Mr. Gaziano received his J.D. in 1988 from the University of Chicago Law School, where he was a John M. Olin Fellow in Law and Economics. He received his B.A. from West Virginia University, summa cum laude in 1985. He was selected as a Truman Scholar from West Virginia while an undergraduate.
Mr. Gaziano’s previous legal work includes service as a law clerk for U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit Judge Edith Jones, as an attorney in the U.S. Department of Justice Office of Legal Counsel, as a chief subcommittee counsel in the U.S. House of Representatives, as a Houston trial attorney, and as a chief corporate legal officer. He also served a six-year term as commissioner on the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights (2008-2013), where he helped conduct oversight and investigations of civil rights agencies.
For most of the last 25 years, Mr. Gaziano was a legal scholar and public interest law leader, promoting individual liberty in the Supreme Court and Congress. From 1997 to 2013, he was the founding director of the Edwin Meese Center for Legal and Judicial Studies at The Heritage Foundation. From 2014 until he joined CIR, he was the Chief of Legal Policy and Strategic Research, and Director of the Center for the Separation of Powers, at Pacific Legal Foundation.
Assistant Director, Practice Groups, The Federalist Society