MSNBC regular and The Nation’s justice correspondent Elie Mystal said Wednesday on “The ReidOut” that President Joe Biden “will not nominate somebody who has been credibly accused of trying to rape somebody when they were in high school” while discussing the replacement for retiring Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer.
Justice Brett Kavanaugh was accused of sexual assault at a high school party in the 1980s by Christine Blasey Ford during his 2018 confirmation hearing.
Mystal said, “First, let’s dispense with the qualifications argument. All of the women that are being bandied about right now are immaculately qualified. In particular, when you talk about Ketanji Brown Jackson, who is maybe the leader in the clubhouse right now, we’re talking about a woman with a Harvard College degree, a Harvard Law degree, who has served as the head of the U.S. sentencing commission, who was a long-term judge who is sitting right on the D.C. Circuit right now.”
He continued, “Quite frankly, of the 115 people who have served on the Supreme Court, 108 of them have been White guys. So maybe it’s actually the other side that has just been looking for the best available white men around. Whereas when you look at the more diverse and the complexity of the country, we can find truly the most qualified candidate for the job.”
Mystal added, “So we should not have an issue about their qualifications, to say nothing of their moral qualification. Because I’m pretty sure, I don’t know this for a fact, but I am pretty sure that Joe Biden will not nominate somebody who has been credibly accused of trying to rape somebody when they were in high school. I’m pretty sure — I don’t know this for a fact that Joe Biden will not nominate someone who was accused of perjury in front of Congress at a previous confirmation hearing. So there are professional qualifications, and there are also moral qualifications that as far as I can see every one of those black women we listed has.”
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