Legal News

Senate GOPers, Dems Sharpening Swords Over Goodwin Liu

By Ashby Jones

Senate Republicans keep hammering away at Goodwin Liu, the Berkeley law professor President Obama nominated to a seat on the Ninth Circuit. But Senate Democrats don’t appear to be giving an inch.

The latest: Senate Democrats on Wednesday refused to further delay the Berkeley law professor's confirmation hearing, now slated for April 16.

The Democrats’ move was a rebuff to Senate Republicans, who stepped up attacks Tuesday on Liu for failing to disclose some of his writings and published remarks submitted ahead of his confirmation hearing. All seven Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee signed a letter complaining of the omissions. Click here for the letter; here for WSJ reporter Jess Bravin’s story on the letter and here for his post at WashWire on the Democrats’ response. Click here (and scroll down) for Liu’s answers to the Senate Judiciary Committee’s questions, as well as the supplemental materials he filed. (Liu reports that he was a “document analyst” for Hogan & Hartson way back in 1992. Our question is simple: Document analyst?)

In their letter to Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D., Vt.), Republican senators strongly hinted the late-filed materials would be part of a broad assault on Liu’s nomination. Republicans blocked the confirmation hearing originally set for March 24, and Tuesday asked to cancel the rescheduled date of April 16.

“At best,” they wrote, Mr. Liu’s late-filed material “demonstrates incompetence; at worst, it creates the impression that he knowingly attempted to hide his most controversial work.” His “unwillingness to take seriously his obligation to complete these basic forms is potentially disqualifying and has placed his nomination in jeopardy,” the letter said.

But on Wednesday, Leahy struck back with a letter of his own.

While "disappointed" that Liu initially overlooked some materials, the newly filed materials "hardly disqualify him from serious consideration by this committee," Leahy wrote. "I believe a fair and thoughtful review of his record, and a public and open exchange during his confirmation hearing, will demonstrate his faithfulness to the rule of law, the Constitution, and established precedents of our judicial system."

We here at the Law Blog have chronicled the Liu saga (here, here, here), which, from the get-go seemed to take on the sort of heated tenor reserved for Supreme Court nominees.

Bravin notes, however, that several prominent voices on the right have spoken in support of Liu, including Ken Starr and John Yoo, who said that for a Democratic president, “Goodwin is an outstanding nominee.”

Full post as published by Law Blog - WSJ.com on April 07, 2010 (boomark / email).