Fox News’ John Roberts pressed Republican Arkansas Sen. Tom Cotton on Wednesday on whether his Tuesday remark about Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson was “a bridge too far.”
Cotton claimed Jackson would have defended the Nazis prosecuted at the Nuremberg trials in the aftermath of World War II due to her record of representing Guantanamo Bay detainees in the early 2000s. He contrasted the nominee to former Supreme Court Justice Robert H. Jackson, who served as the lead American prosecutor during the Nuremberg trials.
Roberts pointed out that Jackson, as a public defender, did not have the option of choosing her clients, leading him to question the senator as to why he would make a connection between the nominee and the Nuremberg trials.
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“When she was in the federal public defender’s office she said she was assigned four cases involving terrorists,” Cotton replied. “But one of those cases, she continued to represent when she was in private practice and could choose her own clients. She took on two more matters in which she signed sends of court briefs when she was advocating on behalf of Guantanamo terrorists. This is three cases in which she voluntarily advocated for the terrorists of Guantanamo Bay in which she accused American soldiers of committing war crimes. I frankly have no patience for it.”
“So you don’t think it was a bridge too far to make the link with Nuremberg and the Nazis?” Roberts asked. (RELATED: ‘I Have No Patience For It’: Tom Cotton Doubles Down On Claim That Ketanji Brown Jackson Would Have Defended Nazis)
The senator reiterated that she defended terrorists that had committed “acts of violence” against Americans and therefore were not entitled to due process in accordance with the law.
“I don’t think she should be on the Supreme Court,” he concluded.
Jackson was assigned to defend four terror suspects held at Guantanamo Bay in 2005. One of her clients, Khiali-Gul, was a Taliban intelligence officer and the suspected leader of a terror cell near the city of Khost, Afghanistan. She accused the U.S. government of initiating torture tactics on detainees at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq and of violating their rights to privately communicate with their private counsel.
Jackson defended representing these detainees at her March 22 confirmation hearing, where she argued the suspects were “entitled” to representation and equal treatment under constitutional and judicial law.