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Bush to take aim at judicial confirmation process |
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By Klaus Marre
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Posted: 11/15/07 12:33 PM [ET] |
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President Bush is expected to criticize the judicial confirmation process in a speech to the Federalist Society Thursday evening, making the case that qualified nominees are dragged through the mud and that the system is in need of reform. “Senate confirmation is part of the Constitution’s system of checks and balances,” the president will say, according to speech excerpts released by the White House. “But it was never intended to be a license to ruin the good name that a nominee has worked a lifetime to build.” According to the speech, Bush believes that too many Beltway insiders “interpret ‘advise and consent’ to mean ‘search and destroy.’ ” The president will argue that senators are no longer asking whether a nominee would uphold the Constitution and the laws that are on the books, but rather want nominees to “guarantee specific outcomes of cases that might come before the court.” Bush will make the case that an additional problem with the current system is that qualified candidates are no longer willing to be considered for openings. “Lawyers approached about being nominated will politely decline because of the ugliness, uncertainty and delay that now characterize the confirmation process,” Bush is expected to say. |
