US Senate confirms first black woman on apex court

US President Joe Biden congratulates Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson after the Senate voted to confirm her to the US Supreme Court.

Ketanji Brown Jackson has been confirmed by the US Senate as the first black woman to serve on the Supreme Court in a milestone for the United States and a victory for President Joe Biden, who made good on a campaign promise as he seeks to infuse the federal judiciary with a broader range of backgrounds. The vote to confirm the 51-year-old federal appellate judge to a lifetime job on the nation’s top judicial body was 53-47, with three Republicans – Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski and Mitt Romney – joining Biden’s fellow Democrats. A simple majority was needed, as Jackson overcame Republican opposition in a Supreme Court confirmation process that remains fiercely partisan. Jackson will take the 83-year-old Breyer’s place on the liberal bloc of a court with an increasingly assertive 6-3 conservative majority. Breyer is due to serve until the court’s current term ends – usually in late June – and Jackson would be formally sworn in after that. Jackson served early in her career as a Supreme Court clerk for Breyer. Democrat Raphael Warnock, one of the Senate’s three Black members, said in debate before the vote: “I’m the father of a young black girl. I know how much it means for Judge Jackson to have navigated the double jeopardy of racism and sexism to now stand in the glory of this moment ... seeing Judge Jackson ascend to the Supreme Court reflects the promise of progress on which our democracy rests. “What a great day it is in America.” Of the 115 people who have served on the Supreme Court since its 1789 founding, all but three have been white. It has had two black justices, both men: Clarence Thomas, appointed in 1991 and still serving, and Thurgood Marshall, who retired in 1991 and died in 1993. Current Justice Sonia Sotomayor is the only Hispanic ever to serve. Jackson will become the sixth woman justice ever. The 51-year-old’s appointment means white men will not be the majority on the nation’s high court for the first time in 233 years. Four of the justices on the nine-member court will be women once Jackson takes her seat, making it the most diverse bench in history – although they all went to law school at Harvard or Yale. Of the five men on the bench, four are white, and Clarence Thomas is African American. Presidential nominations to the Supreme Court have become a flashpoint in American politics. The court wields great influence in shaping American policy on hot-button issues including abortion, guns, voting laws, religious liberty, the death penalty and race-based practices. Before Jackson joins it, the top court is due to rule in major cases including one that could overturn the landmark 1973 decision that legalised abortion nationwide and another that could expand gun rights. Mitch McConnell, the Senate’s top Republican, criticised Jackson in the debate before the vote, calling her the choice of the “radical left” and saying that her “disturbing” judicial record included injecting personal policy biases in rulings and treating convicted criminals as gently as possible in sentencing. Vice-President Kamala Harris, who became the first black woman to hold that post after Biden selected her as his 2020 election running mate, presided over the vote. Afterward, Harris told reporters Jackson’s confirmation “makes a very important statement about who we aspire to be” as a nation and that there will be “full representation and the finest and brightest and the best” on the Supreme Court. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer noted the country’s legacy of slavery and past struggles to bring rights to women and black Americans, adding: “Today we are taking a giant, bold and important step on the well-trodden path toward fulfilling our country’s founding promise.” During March confirmation hearings, Jackson said she would bring to the Supreme Court her life experiences and perspectives including time as a judge, a court-appointed lawyer for criminal defendants who could not afford an attorney, a member of a federal commission on criminal sentencing and “being a black woman, lucky inheritor of the civil rights dream”. A new Politico/Morning Consult poll showed almost half of voters said the Senate should support her. Just 26% don’t think she should get a yes vote, while 25% had no opinion. Like the three conservative justices appointed by Biden’s Republican predecessor Donald Trump, Jackson is young enough to serve for decades in the lifetime job.