Sen. Amy Klobuchar questions Biden Supreme Court nominee

WASHINGTON – Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar helped Senate Democrats make a stalwart case for Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson on Tuesday, in the face of repeated Republican attempts to impugn her integrity, including accusations that she had gone light on sentences in child pornography offenses.

"You come before us with this incredible strength, legal acumen [and] grace under pressure that you have demonstrated today," Klobuchar told Jackson during about a half-hour of questions and comments.

Ahead of Klobuchar's questions, Jackson pushed back strongly against suggestions that she has given light sentences to child pornographers.

Could her rulings have endangered children? "As a mother and a judge," Jackson said, "nothing could be further from the truth."

She described looking into the eyes of defendants and emphasizing the lifelong effects on victims. She said it is "important to me to represent that the children's voices are represented."

While Klobuchar asked Jackson about the right to vote, antitrust laws and journalists' role in democracy, President Joe Biden's nominee was met with pointed questions from some Republican lawmakers who dug into her legal career.

Klobuchar, a Democratic member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, asked what work can be done to maintain public confidence in the court. The judge made clear that "public confidence in the court is crucial" and pointed to her own family's history that she said showed her grandparents had a grade school education and her parents "were the first in their families to get to go to college."

Klobuchar praised Jackson's comments on the child pornography cases, saying she appreciated how Jackson had spoken earlier in the morning.

"Would it surprise you at all that other judges, including a number of them that were supported by our colleagues on the other side of the aisle, have given out similar sentences in child pornography cases?" Klobuchar asked.

Jackson answered that it would not surprise her "because these cases are horrific and there's a lot of disparity because of the way the guidelines are operating in this particular area."

"But in every case that I handled involving these terrible crimes, I looked at the law and the facts. I made sure that the victims, the children's perspectives, were represented," Jackson said.

On Monday, Klobuchar praised Jackson during opening comments. Tuesday's hearing allowed Klobuchar to ask about topics — including voting and antitrust laws — the senator has focused on in Washington.

Jackson answered in part that "courts are not policymakers and judges should not be importing their own policy preferences."

Jackson was announced as Biden's Supreme Court pick last month. Democrats hold a narrow majority in the Senate, but could approve Jackson's nomination on the strength of their party's control of the chamber alone, without GOP support.

If Jackson is confirmed, her nomination would not shift the current conservative control of the Supreme Court. Jackson also faced questions from other lawmakers about her career, judicial philosophy and the contentious debate about expanding the Supreme Court.

"My north star is the consideration of the proper role of a judge in our constitutional scheme," Jackson said when asked about the issue of changing the court's size. "And in my view, judges should not be speaking in to political issues and certainly not a nominee for a position on the Supreme Court."

Earlier in Tuesday's hearing, Jackson bristled at questions from GOP South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, who voted for her confirmation as an appeals court judge last year but has openly expressed his frustration after Biden picked her over a South Carolina judge.

Jackson defended the work she did around 15 years ago as a public defender and later in private practice representing four Guantanamo Bay detainees. Jackson appeared taken aback during further questioning on her detainee work from Republican Texas Sen. John Cornyn, who asked why she would have called former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and former President George W. Bush "war criminals" in a legal filing.

"It seems so out of character for you," Cornyn said.

Jackson said she didn't remember "that particular reference," but that she would look into it. After a break, Democratic Judiciary Committee Chairman Dick Durbin of Illinois noted — and Jackson confirmed — that she had filed petitions that made a variety of claims arguing for the release of Guantanamo detainees, including that the treatment of the detainees constituted torture and violated federal law.

She never referred to anyone as a war criminal, but she did argue that torture amounted to a war crime under the law and that the federal government, including Bush and Rumsfeld, was ultimately responsible.

Jackson is a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, but she also worked as a U.S. District Court judge for the District of Columbia and is a former federal public defender. Another round of questions from lawmakers is expected Wednesday.