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Melissa Harris-Perry: It's The Takeaway. I'm Melissa Harris-Perry. Thanks for starting your week with us.

Ketanji Brown Jackson: Thank you very much, Mr. President. I am truly humbled by the extraordinary honor of this nomination, and I am especially grateful for the care that you have taken in discharging your constitutional duty in service of our democracy with all that is going on in the world today.

Melissa Harris-Perry: You were listening to Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson speaking during her nomination to the Supreme Court in late February. Judge Jackson currently serves on the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit, and if confirmed, Jackson will be a first on the Supreme Court.

Speaker 1: Judge Jackson would be the first Black woman to serve as a Justice.

Speaker 2: To serve as the first Black woman of the US Supreme Court.

Speaker 3: She would be the high court's first Black woman.

Speaker 4: The first Black woman to be nominated.

Melissa Harris-Perry: Yes, yes, yes, that. Also, Jackson would become the first former Federal Public Defender to take a seat on the nation's highest court. The only other member of the court ever to have had criminal defense experience was the late Justice Thurgood Marshall. Now, during Judge Jackson's time as a Federal Public Defender, she was appointed to represent detainees at the US military prison in Guantanamo Bay, and it's among some of the things that many in Republican leadership have found to question about her nomination.

Speaker 5: I suppose what bothers some of us Republicans is that she's the favorite candidate of these left-wing dark money groups that are also advocating packing of the Supreme Court.

Speaker 6: She was not particularly forthcoming on what I consider to be a very important question, is her judicial philosophy.

Speaker 7: Where Judge Jackson stands on the Constitution remains a secret.

Melissa Harris-Perry: Well, as you can hear, the senators seem to think there's no information about this, but in fact, Judge Jackson did describe her approach as more methodological than ideological during her confirmation hearings to the US Court of Appeals last April.

Ketanji Brown Jackson: Not really a philosophy, more of a methodology. It is the idea that it is only appropriate for the judge to take into account the arguments of the parties, the facts in the case, and the law that applies in every case. I have found that if you do that, you can be consistent in the way that you're analyzing the issues and you can set aside any thoughts about who is making the arguments, what advantages any side might take away from your opinions. If you have a fidelity to the rule of law that is grounded in looking at only those inputs, then I think you can rule without fear or favor, which is what I attempted to do.

Melissa Harris-Perry: With me now is Fatima Goss Graves, president of the National Women's Law Center. Fatima, welcome back to The Takeaway.

Fatima Goss Graves: So glad to be here.

Melissa Harris-Perry: Now, it's worth noting to look at some other women who have been nominated and confirmed to the court. When the late Ruth Bader Ginsburg was confirmed to the court in '93, Senate voted 96-3. When Amy Coney Barrett was confirmed to the court in 2020, the vote was 52-47, with every single Democrat opposed to her confirmation, so what has changed about this process that goes from basically unanimity to nearly a party-line vote?

Fatima Goss Graves: The last three justices who were confirmed to the Supreme Court were done so under really dramatic circumstances. Amy Coney Barrett, her nomination occurred after millions of people had already voted for a different president, for President Biden, and so that was not a typical time. Then you have Justice Kavanaugh, whose nomination came with the backdrop of very serious allegations of sexual violence that were not seriously reviewed in any way. If you think about Justice Gorsuch, his nomination was to a seat that Mitch McConnell had blocked for a year and not filled when President Obama was in office.

I think there's an opportunity with Judge Jackson for the Senate to do a bit of a reset to understand and look at this particular nominee who is so extraordinarily credentialed and qualified and actually holds a lot of promise to help us think about the court differently. We are in very different times for sure than we were 30 years ago, but I also think Judge Jackson is the nominee that can unify people.

Melissa Harris-Perry: I love this idea that there's an opportunity, do you have a sense of the likelihood that that opportunity will be acted on by both parties?

Fatima Goss Graves: Well, I'll give you some good news and some bad news. The good news is that she has done the thing the last couple of weeks in advance of her hearing where she's had these one-on-one meetings with senators. All of the report outs-- And they don't surprise anyone who's ever met her or appeared before her, all of the report outs have been that these meetings have gone extremely well.

Even with senators who aren't inclined to support her, you could see they respected her, and that piece there is really important. We will, this whole week, see her appearing, and the whole country will get to know who she is. The bad news is we've already seen in advance of the hearing a lot of real silliness, some efforts to distort her record, some efforts to try to paint her with a brush that doesn't fit, and some usual resorting of some racist and sexist ridiculousness in the media but also a little bit coming from the Senate, and so that is a signal that it isn't going to be unifying for everyone.

The opportunity is there with this particular nominee for sure, and I actually think that's what the country wants. I think the country wants to be together and to be proud of this moment in history.

Melissa Harris-Perry: What does someone learn by being a public defender? Undoubtedly, this is going to come up, this will be part of the conversation. In the broadest sense, what should we be wanting to know about what someone's experience as a public defender taught them about the law?

Fatima Goss Graves: I think this is the most important thing about her background. She is deeply familiar with the experiences that individuals have as they go through our criminal system. She knows what it means for themselves, but she knows what it means for their families. I actually think we've already seen that aspect, that background show up in her judging. She is known for basically being a teacher type of judge, being really, really clear with people who appear before her. There's no confusion about what it means for them to plea. There's no confusion about access to our justice system in her courtroom.

The fact that we haven't had someone like that on the bench for all these years, as the Court has made really important decision after decision impacting people who have contact with our criminal justice system, that has been a disservice. I am excited about having that level of diversity on the court. I think it will change the types of conversations that happen in that room.

Melissa Harris-Perry: For all the talk about quotas or about race and gender or about her identity, I'm struck that there are no Black women currently serving in the US Senate, and unless there's a 50/50 tie and VP Harris has to break it, there's going to be no Black women voting on her confirmation. What does that tell us, I suppose in part about-- I love this language that you used, "She is a teacher type of judge," what does that teach us about our current system?

Fatima Goss Graves: It's a problem. I actually think many lawyers around the country have been having very public and I'm sure all those sorts of private conversations about this moment of representation and reminder that every type of institution should have Black women in it and what it has meant that we haven't, but it's also highlighting the giant gaps. It is a giant gap, that in 2022, there are no Black women in the Senate, and we see it come up in the context of nominations and who's in the various rooms and having the opportunity to vote, but it also is a giant gap in the range of policy matters that are on the table.

I think about when Vice President Kamala Harris first came to the Senate, she championed a range of issues that hadn't really been on the forefront of the agenda in the Senate, things like maternal mortality. She introduced a bill related to fibroids. Black women disproportionately have fibroids. She took a lead on the pay gap but from a perspective that looked at race and gender together, it mattered having her voice there.

Now, she is now in the White House bringing that voice to that perspective, so I'm not trying to say that, but it shouldn't be up to one human to be in all of the rooms. It matters who is in charge of making our laws and executing our laws and enforcing our laws.

Melissa Harris-Perry: You say it shouldn't be up to one human to be in all the rooms. It's worth noting that even if Judge Jackson is confirmed, there'll still be a 6-3 conservative majority on the court. What do you think will be Judge Jackson's role on a court where she's often likely, I mean we don't know how [unintelligible 00:11:02], but she may likely be in the position of dissent and maybe dissent on some of the most polarizing cases that are coming before the court.

Fatima Goss Graves: Dissents really matter. I know people don't like to think about it in these terms, but they actually do with-- When Justice Ginsburg was on the court, she had a special collar she would wear on the days she was going to dissent with vigor. You knew something was coming when she showed up in that collar. They matter because they are a reminder that there's an alternative view from the direction the court is taking, but it also matters because the dissents of today become the majority opinions of tomorrow.

I think about some of the dissents that Justice Thomas started writing 30 years ago, and oftentimes, he was by himself writing these dissents. Some of those views, he still found himself a majority. I will say that I believe firmly that having her in the room could help to shape things pretty early on, and over the long haul, we will see her having an ability to really make her mark.

Melissa Harris-Perry: One last question for you. I know that you are going to be rallying in front of the Supreme Court building today in Washington DC. Tell me about that. Who will be there? Why is this important to National Women's Law Center?

Fatima Goss Graves: That's right. There will be events outside this entire week, but on the first day of the hearings, we thought it was important to lead this conversation with Black women at the forefront. We have partnered with She Will Rise and with Black Women's Roundtable. You're going to see Black women leaders from throughout the country speaking to why this nomination matters, speaking to what they hope to see, their hopes and dreams, speaking about our democracy. People have sent delegations from around the country to rally with us. We'll have music, it will be a celebration. That's how we're kicking off the week of hearings.

Melissa Harris-Perry: Fatima Goss Graves is president of the National Women's Law Center. Thank you for joining The Takeaway, Fatima.

Fatima Goss Graves: Thanks for having me.

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