Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) called Republican senators treatment of Supreme Court nominee Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson at last week’s hearing “embarrassing” and “disgraceful.”
“It was disgraceful, it really was, what I saw. And I met with her and I read all the transcripts. I listened to basically the hearings and it just was embarrassing,” Manchin told reporters Tuesday morning, according to The Hill.
“It’s not who we are. It’s not what we were sent here to do, to attack other people and just try to tear them down. I won’t be part of that. I think she’s extremely well qualified and I think she’ll be an exemplary judge,” he added.
During the hearings, Republican senators smeared Judge Jackson with outright lies about her record on child pornography cases and critical race theory.
Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) claim Jackson was “soft” on child pornography offenders. Fact-checkers say his allegations of leniency are misleading and echoes conspiracy theories from QAnon.
The Chairman of the Senate Judiciary committee Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill) had to intervene as Ted Cruz (R-Tx) went over the allotted time limit to grill Jackson on her sentencing for child sex criminals, gender and critical race theory. Cruz then engaged in a back and forth with Durbin and later checked his Twitter mentions after the confrontation.
Durbin told reporters on Monday that nearly half a dozen Republican senators on the committee were disrespectful to Jackson.
“This notion of asking the toughest and meanest questions and then race to Twitter to see if somebody is tweeting it, I mean that’s as bad as playing to the cameras on the worst day,” he said, The Hill reported.
Manchin announced last week that he will support Judge Jackson’s confirmation to the Supreme Court. His support increases the likelihood that Jackson will be confirmed to the Supreme Court with the support of all 50 Senate Democrats. She will become the first Black woman to serve on the high court.
