Too progressive. Too moderate. Bad for workers. The whispers and background chatter about top contenders for the Supreme Court are growing as President Biden zeroes in on a nominee to replace retiring Justice Stephen Breyer. And while the president is eager for input, the White House insists he’s not going to be swayed by any sniping. “He is going to pick an eminently qualified Black woman to nominate to the Supreme Court and he has a number of potential candidates that he’s very excited about,” promises White House press secretary Jen Psaki. There’s a long history of lobbying campaigns for and against Supreme Court candidates, the former sometimes launched by those who try to catch the ear of presidential advisers to extol a potential nominee’s virtues. In one famous example, Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s husband Marty was widely credited with making a massive behind-the-scenes effort to get his wife on the court. “Yes, he was my campaign manager,” the late justice later said of her husband. Advocacy groups, legal groups, scholars and lawmakers also weigh in. Today, anyone on Twitter can, too. Biden, expected to make his choice this month, has promised to nominate a Black woman. That alone has drawn criticism from some conservatives who claim that he’s being unfair to other qualified judges by narrowing his choices. The conservative Club for Growth, which went all-out in support of Amy Coney Barrett’s nomination to the court by President Donald Trump, has been running an ad that highlights Hispanic judges who won’t be on the list and claiming Biden’s decision to narrow the field is racist. The Supreme Court was made up of white men for two centuries. There has never been a Black woman named to the court. Justice Sonia Sotomayor is the first Hispanic. There has also never been an Asian, Native American or Pacific Islander on the court. Biden has solicited input from lawmakers and legal groups as he makes his decision. The White House sent out a photo Wednesday of former Sen. Doug Jones, Biden’s team leader on the nomination, at work “making calls to senators from both parties.” But the president, who was deeply involved in plenty of Supreme Court nominations during his decades as head of the Senate Judiciary Committee and as vice president, is “not going to be swayed by public campaigns or public sniping or lobbying efforts,” Psaki said. The three top contenders for the job are federal appeals court Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, 51, California state Supreme Court judge Leondra Kruger, 45, and U.S. District Court Judge J. Michelle Childs, 55. Each finalist has a long set of bona fides and powerful backers, as well as some critics. Jackson, thought to be the favorite, has been touted by top civil rights attorneys and lawyer associations. She’s also been criticized as potentially too progressive by some. A former federal judge wrote to the president to tell him Jackson’s decision on a lawsuit involving Lockheed Martin and Black workers was unjust to the workers. Kruger would be the first person in more than 40 years to move from a state court to the Supreme Court. High-level attorneys and at least one former solicitor general have praised her. Some of her critics claim she’s too moderate for a Democrat. Childs specialized in employment law before […]

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