[Congressional Record Volume 163, Number 176 (Tuesday, October 31, 2017)]
[Senate]
[Pages S6885-S6886]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          JUDICIAL NOMINATIONS

  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, yesterday the Senate advanced the 
nomination of Professor Amy Barrett, President Trump's impressive 
nominee to be a judge on the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. She is 
the first of four strong nominees to our Nation's circuit courts that 
the Senate will confirm this week.
  Professor Barrett's experience as a distinguished law professor at 
the University of Notre Dame shows her qualifications to serve our 
Nation on the Federal bench. She is going to be an asset to our 
judiciary.
  Of course, some on the left have tried to invent any reason to 
prevent this President's nominees from advancing. For an outstanding 
nominee such as Professor Barrett, their task was not easy. They can't 
attack her credentials, which are truly impressive; they can't attack 
her belief in the rule of law--Professor Barrett's writings and her 
testimony clearly show a nominee who will uphold our Constitution and 
our Nation's laws as they are written--as they are written--not as she 
wishes they were.
  Unbelievably, some on the political left, including some of our 
Democratic colleagues, are actually criticizing Professor Barrett for a 
law review article she cowrote back in law school by saying it says the 
opposite of what it actually says.
  They claim Professor Barrett wrote that a judge should put her 
personal beliefs ahead of the rule of law, when, in fact, she said a 
judge should not do

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that--exactly the opposite. She wrote that if a judge's personal views 
were to impede that judge's ability to impartially apply the law, then 
the judge should recuse herself from the case.
  As the coauthor of that article and current president of Catholic 
University recently put it, ``The case against Prof. Barrett is so 
flimsy, that you have to wonder whether there isn't some other, 
unspoken, cause for their objection.''
  It does make you wonder.
  To those using this matter as cover to oppose Professor Barrett 
because of her personally held religious beliefs, let me remind you, 
there are no religious tests--none--for public office in this country. 
That is not how we do things here. Our government and our Nation are 
made better through the service of qualified people of faith. That will 
surely be true of Professor Amy Barrett.
  I look forward to voting to confirm this accomplished law professor 
and devoted mother of seven later today, and I would urge our 
colleagues to join me.
  Once we do, the Senate will advance another of President Trump's 
well-qualified circuit court nominees, Michigan Supreme Court Justice 
Joan Larsen, to serve on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth 
Circuit.
  Justice Larsen is the second of three accomplished women whom the 
Senate will consider this week for appointment to our circuit courts. I 
assume that all three of these impressive women will receive strong 
support from our Democratic colleagues who never seem to miss an 
opportunity to talk about the war on women.
  Here is what nominees such as Larsen and Barrett and the others we 
will consider this week represent for our Federal judiciary: equal 
justice under the law for all and a fair shake for every litigant. What 
a refreshing departure from President Obama and his so-called empathy 
standard for selecting judicial nominees--really just another of the 
left's ideological purity tests and one that was anything but 
empathetic for individuals on the other side of the case. If you are 
the litigant for whom the judge does not have empathy, you are in a 
tough position before such a judge.
  Finally, I would like to express my gratitude, once again, to 
Chairman Chuck Grassley for his continued work to bring these 
outstanding nominees to the Senate floor.

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