The Senate Judiciary Committee will wrap up its fourth and final day of hearings on the nomination of Ketanji Brown Jackson to become the first Black woman on the Supreme Court.
Chairman Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., is expected to hold the committee vote on April 4 to send the nomination to the full Senate.
Even if all 11 Republicans on the committee vote to block Jackson’s groundbreaking nomination, Democrats can still push it to the full Senate for approval.
“A tie vote doesn’t stop us,” Durbin declared late Wednesday night.
Legal interest groups, including the American Bar Association and civil rights organizations, will testify about Jackson’s qualifications for the court. In contrast, conservative outside groups will likely warn about her liberal views.
The more high-minded debate comes after a marathon two-day barrage of questioning from senators that some GOP lawmakers occasionally turned into a circus with repeated interruptions and outlandish lines of questioning and props.
The GOP criticism at her confirmation hearing was punctuated with effusive praise from Democrats, and by reflections on the historic nature of her nomination.
None was more riveting than Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., who drew tears from Jackson when he praised her as a credit to their African-American ancestors.
“I know what it’s taken for you to sit here in this seat,” he said. “You have earned this spot.”
Jackson, a respected appeals court judge, would become the third African American to sit on the court and only the sixth woman in its 233-year history.
