March, 21 2022, 09:30am EDT
In New Report, Lawyers' Committee Recommends the Confirmation of Supreme Court Nominee Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson
Nominee is a Fair-Minded Jurist Committed to Civil Rights and Justice for All
WASHINGTON
The Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law released a report on Monday evaluating Supreme Court nominee Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson and recommending that she be confirmed by the Senate. In the report, which reflects a thorough review of Judge Jackson's record on civil rights issues of importance to the Lawyers' Committee's mission, the Lawyers' Committee found that she possesses not only the exceptional competence necessary to serve on the Court, but also that she approaches legal questions with a profound respect for the importance of protecting the civil rights afforded by the Constitution and the nation's civil rights laws. For these reasons, the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law unequivocally supports the nomination of Judge Jackson to the Supreme Court of the United States.
"After carefully vetting Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson's record, it is clear that she has the extraordinary qualifications, experience, and character to serve the nation on the Supreme Court," said Damon Hewitt, president and executive director of the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law. "Judge Jackson is a highly skilled and meticulous jurist who will bring a welcome perspective to the high court as the first Justice with experience as a public defender, and the first since Justice Thurgood Marshall to bring significant criminal defense experience to the Court. Just as Justice Marshall broke barriers as the first Black justice, Judge Jackson will become the first Black woman to serve on the Supreme Court when she is confirmed. Judge Jackson's extraordinary legal career demonstrates that she will be a champion for justice, and a defender of civil rights, and can be counted on to be fair and impartial as the Court decides some of the most monumental cases of our time. She is the right person for this moment and will help the Supreme Court return to its highest calling of being a driver of fairness and equality."
The report is accompanied by a letter of support signed by over 100 members of the Lawyers' Committee's national advisory Board and its Executive Committee--all among the nation's leading attorneys in the private bar, corporate and nonprofit leadership, and the legal academy.
Shirlethia V. Franklin, who chaired a committee of leading attorneys who served on the organization's Supreme Court Nomination Committee, stated: "Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson's remarkable record reflects a jurist who respects and follows the letter of the law while never losing sight of the practical impact of her rulings on the parties who appear before her. Once confirmed, Judge Jackson will be the first Black woman Justice to serve on the Supreme Court in the Court's 232-year history, marking a tremendous moment for the Court and our nation. Her highly anticipated presence on the Court--bringing with her a breadth of experiences, sterling credentials, and a judicial philosophy that applies the law equally to all--would be a significant step forward for our democracy."
Recognizing the Supreme Court's critical role in civil rights enforcement and the central role that the Court plays in our democracy, the Lawyers' Committee has long reviewed the record of nominees to the Court to determine if they demonstrate views that are consistent with the core civil rights principles for which the organization has long advocated. Like prior Lawyers' Committee reports on Supreme Court nominees, the report on Judge Jackson is based on the nominee's full record--including opinions she authored or joined while serving on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit and the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, her tenure on the U.S. Sentencing Commission, testimony during her three prior confirmation hearings, and her work and writings as a private attorney and a federal public defender.
View the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law report here.
The Lawyers' Committee is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization, formed in 1963 at the request of President John F. Kennedy to enlist the private bar's leadership and resources in combating racial discrimination and the resulting inequality of opportunity - work that continues to be vital today.
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Arrests of US Journalists Surged in 2024 Amid Crackdown on Gaza Protests
Police use of "catch-and-release" tactics is particularly worrying for press freedom advocates, according to the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker.
Dec 12, 2024
Arrests and detainments of journalists in the United States surged in 2024 compared to the year prior, according to the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker, a project of the Freedom of the Press Foundation.
The tracker reports that journalists were arrested or detained by police at least 48 times this year—eclipsing the number of arrests that took place in the previous two years combined, and constituting the third highest number of yearly arrests and detentions since the project began cataloging press freedom violations in 2017. 2020, however, still stands as far and away the year with the most arrests and detentions.
The 48 arrests and detentions this year is also part of a larger list of "press freedom incidents" that the tracker documents, including things like equipment damage, equipment seizure, and assault.
While a year with a high number of protests typically leads to more arrests, "it was protests in response to the Israel-Gaza war that caused this year's uptick," according to the tracker.
The vast majority of the arrests and detainments out of the total 48 were linked to these sorts of demonstrations, and it was protests at Columbia University's Manhattan campus that were the site of this year's largest detainment of journalists.
The report also recounts the story of Roni Jacobson, a freelance reporter whose experience on the last day of 2023 was a harbinger of press freedom incidents to come in 2024. Jacobson was on assignment to cover a pro-Palestinian demonstration for the New York Daily News on December 31, 2023 when she was told to leave by police because she didn't have city-issued press credentials with her. She recounted that she accidentally bumped into an officer and was arrested. She was held overnight at a precinct and then released after the charges against her, which included disorderly conduct, were dropped.
Even five arrests that the tracker deems "election-related" took place at protests that were "at least partially if not entirely focused on the Israel-Gaza war." Three of those election-related arrests took place at protests happening around the Democratic National Convention in August.
One police force in particular bears responsibility for this year's crackdown: Nearly 50% of the arrests of journalists this year were at the hands of the New York Police Department (NYPD). Many of those taken into custody had their charges dropped quickly, but the tracker notes that the NYPD's use of "catch-and-release" tactics was particularly worrying to press freedom advocates.
Two photojournalists, Josh Pacheco and Olga Federova, were detained four times this year in both New York City and Chicago while photographing protests. They were both "assaulted and arrested and [had] their equipment damaged" while documenting police clearing a student encampment at Manhattan's Fashion Institute of Technology; however, they were released the next day and told their arrests had been voided.
"While [we are] glad that some common sense prevailed by the NYPD not charging these two photographers with any crime, we are very concerned that they are perfecting 'catch-and-release' to an art form,” Mickey Osterreicher, general counsel for the National Press Photographers Association, told the tracker.
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Besides covering protests, 2024 also saw the continued practice of "criminally charging journalists for standard journalistic practices," according to the tracker. For example, one investigative journalist in Los Angeles was repeatedly threatened with arrest while attempting to cover a homeless encampment sweep in the city, and then was detained in October, though he was let go without charges.
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President-elect Donald Trump said Wednesday that he has chosen Kari Lake, a far-right election denier and failed U.S. Senate candidate, to lead the federally funded international broadcast network Voice of America, a move that critics said underscores Trump's effort to transform government entities into vehicles to advance his own interests.
In a Truth Social post, Trump wrote that as director of VOA, Lake would "ensure that the American values of Freedom and Liberty are broadcast around the World FAIRLY and ACCURATELY, unlike the lies spread by the Fake News Media."
Lake, a former television news anchor in Arizona who has echoed Trump's insidious attacks on journalists, wrote in response to the president-elect's announcement that she was "honored" to be asked to lead VOA, which she characterized as "a vital international media outlet dedicated to advancing the interests of the United States by engaging directly with people across the globe and promoting democracy and truth." VOA, which is supposed to have editorial independence, has long faced criticism for its coverage and treatment of employees.
Though the VOA's Charter states that the outlet will "present a balanced and comprehensive projection of significant American thought and institutions," Lake made clear that she views the network as a propaganda channel for the United States.
"Under my leadership, the VOA will excel in its mission: chronicling America's achievements worldwide," Lake, an outspoken Trump loyalist, wrote Wednesday.
Hours after Trump's announcement that she's his pick to lead VOA, Lake applaudedTIME magazine for naming Trump its "Person of the Year" and gushed that he "should have been the Person of the Year every year for the last decade."
Journalists and watchdogs expressed a mixture of alarm and mockery in response to Trump's attempt to elevate Lake to VOA director.
"Kari Lake as (head of) Voice of America is the stuff of parody. Or tragedy," Robert Weissman, co-president of Public Citizen, wrote on social media. "VOA matters."
Zeteo's Mehdi Hasan added that "authoritarians love to control and instrumentalize media organizations, especially state-funded ones."
"Good luck to the VOA," he wrote.
VOA is the largest federally funded international broadcaster and is overseen by the U.S. Agency for Global Media.
It is not clear whether Trump will be able to easily install Lake as VOA director. The Washington Post noted that "under rules passed in 2020, the VOA director is appointed by a majority vote of a seven-member advisory board."
"Six members of the board are named by the president and require Senate consent, and the seventh member is the secretary of state," the Post explained.
During his first term in the White House, Trump's pick to lead the U.S. Agency for Global Media worked aggressively to influence VOA coverage.
"In 2020, Mr. Trump appointed Michael Pack, an ally of his former aide Stephen K. Bannon, to run the U.S. Agency for Global Media," The New York Timessummarized on Thursday. "Mr. Pack was accused of trying to turn Voice of America into a mouthpiece for the Trump administration, and a federal judge ruled that Mr. Pack had violated the First Amendment rights of the outlet's journalists. A federal investigation later found that Mr. Pack had grossly mismanaged the U.S. Agency for Global Media, repeatedly abusing his power by sidelining executives he felt did not sufficiently support Mr. Trump."
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U.S. President Joe Biden on Thursday announced that he is commuting the sentences of nearly 1,500 Americans and pardoning 39 people convicted of nonviolent crimes, a move the White House described as "the largest single-day grant of clemency in modern history."
But the president's sweeping use of his clemency power as his term nears its conclusion did not appear to extend to any of the 40 men currently on death row—some of whom have been there for decades.
According to a White House fact sheet, those who received commutations "have been serving their sentences at home for at least one year under the Covid-era CARES Act," a law that extended the amount of time in which people could be placed in home confinement to reduce the spread of the virus in prisons.
The White House did not name those who received pardons or commutations but said the list includes a "decorated military veteran," a "nurse who has led emergency response for several natural disasters," and "an addiction counselor who volunteers his time to help young people find their purpose."
The Biden Justice Department paused federal executions in 2021, but President-elect Donald Trump pledged on the campaign trail to expand the use of the death penalty and is expected to allow the executions of the 40 men on death row to take place if they're still there when he takes office next month.
In a statement on Thursday, Biden said that he has "the great privilege of extending mercy to people who have demonstrated remorse and rehabilitation, restoring opportunity for Americans to participate in daily life and contribute to their communities, and taking steps to remove sentencing disparities for non-violent offenders, especially those convicted of drug offenses."
"That is why, today, I am pardoning 39 people who have shown successful rehabilitation and have shown commitment to making their communities stronger and safer," the president said. "I am also commuting the sentences of nearly 1,500 people who are serving long prison sentences—many of whom would receive lower sentences if charged under today’s laws, policies, and practices. These commutation recipients, who were placed on home confinement during the Covid pandemic, have successfully reintegrated into their families and communities and have shown that they deserve a second chance."
Biden, who campaigned on ending the death penalty at the federal level, vowed to "take more steps in the weeks ahead" as his administration reviews clemency petitions, leaving open the possibility of commutations for death row prisoners.
But he's running out of time, human rights organizations, religious leaders, former federal judges, and progressive lawmakers have warned in recent days as they've ramped up pressure on Biden to act.
"State-sanctioned murder is not justice, and President Biden has an opportunity and an obligation to save lives and make good on his campaign promise to address the federal death penalty before leaving office," Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) said at a press conference earlier this week. "With the incoming administration planning to execute the 40 individuals on death row, we're calling on the president to use his clemency authority to commute their death sentences and resentence them to a prison term."
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