Beware Brett Kavanaugh: Trump's Favorite Justice |
If I asked you to name the most unpopular Supreme Court justice, you might choose the venal Clarence Thomas or the perpetually enraged Samuel Alito. In either event, you’d be wrong. Americans’ least popular member of the high tribunal is Brett “I like beer” Kavanaugh. Poll after poll has shown Kavanaugh taking the honor since his nomination in 2018.
Kavanaugh also holds the honor of being President Donald Trump’s favorite justice, an accolade he earned with his dissenting opinion from the court’s February invalidation of Trump’s worldwide “reciprocal tariffs.” Kavanaugh is now poised to deliberate on pending voting rights cases and a ruling on birthright citizenship under the 14th Amendment. It’s frightening but indisputable: The future of American law may rest in his ideological, incompetent hands.
Kavanaugh’s initial low public standing stemmed from his snarling televised response to the testimony of psychologist Cristine Blasey Ford, who credibly accused him during his confirmation hearing of sexually assaulting her at a boozy high school party. Declaring his innocence and choking back tears, Kavanaugh described the allegations as “a calculated and orchestrated political hit, fueled with apparent pent-up anger about President Trump [and] millions of dollars in money from outside left-wing opposition groups.” Trump quickly came to his embattled nominee’s rescue in a tweet posted hours after the hearing, calling his testimony “powerful, honest, and riveting.”
Long before Senate Republicans approved his nomination by a vote of 50-48, Kavanaugh had built a well-earned reputation as a credentialed and loyal Republican hitman, highlighted by his decision to join Ken Starr’s Office of Independent Counsel in 1997 to assist in the investigations that eventually led to the impeachment of President Bill Clinton.
Since taking his place on the Supreme Court, Kavanaugh has proven a reliable Trump flunky. But unlike Thomas and Alito, he’s also proven to be an intellectual lightweight.
While in Starr’s service, Kavanaugh penned a lurid memorandum that suggested 10 questions for prosecutors to ask Clinton about his relationship with Monica Lewinsky when he testified before a federal grand jury. Among them:
“If Monica Lewinsky says that you ejaculated into her mouth on two occasions in the Oval Office area, would she be lying?”
“If Monica Lewinsky says that on several occasions you had her give [you] oral sex, made her stop, and then ejaculated into the sink in the bathroom off the Oval Office, would she be lying?”
“If Monica Lewinsky says that you masturbated into a trashcan in your secretary’s office, would she b[e] lying?”
After a brief stint in private practice, Kavanaugh joined the GOP’s legal team in the run-up to the Supreme Court’s infamous Bush v. Gore decision, which handed the presidency to George W. Bush. In 2001, he was rewarded with an associate’s position in the White House counsel’s office, and two years later he was nominated to the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.
Senate Democrats were alarmed at the thought of an enrobed Kavanaugh, and they managed to put the nominee through two confirmation hearings. “As I look through all of the different issues that you have been involved in as an attorney in public service and the private sector, it seems that you are the Zelig or Forrest Gump of Republican politics,” the normally mild-mannered Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) remarked in 2004. “You show up at every scene of the crime. You are somehow or another deeply involved, whether it is Elian Gonzalez or the Starr Report, you are there.” In the end, the Democrats failed to stop Kavanaugh’s confirmation in 2006.
During his 12 years on the circuit court, Kavanaugh won praise from right-wing advocacy organizations........