Senate Confirmation Hearings

Judge Robert Bork, R.I.P

Sheila Liaugminas | 20 December 2012

May the tributes this great jurist deserves establish his legacy, and may the caricatures fade away.

Kagan finessed the military issue

Sheila Liaugminas | 06 July 2010

By last week’s end, everyone knew Elena Kagan charmed most of our elected representatives involved in the Senate confirmation hearings and deftly maneuvered her way past any confrontations with her own assessment of those hearings as vapid and hollow, while she danced past any interrogations into her radical support for partial-birth abortion in the Clinton adminstration.

Kagan’s politics

Sheila Liaugminas | 30 June 2010

The Supreme Court nominee has trained well for the very confirmation hearing process she once sharply and publicly criticized. So now she’s being as politically correct as she needs to be, while denying she’ll be political at all on the court. What’s wrong with this picture?

Supreme Court’s ‘Big Monday’

Sheila Liaugminas | 28 June 2010

For Court watchers, this was expected to be a big day. As it wrapped up its session for summer break and released its final decisions, the Court made news early on, while the Senate opened confirmation hearings on the newest court nominee...

Kagan’s confirmation hearings

Sheila Liaugminas | 28 June 2010

Add this to the spectator sports going on right now in exciting arenas….World Cup. Wimbledon. Prelude to the Tour de France. Buildup to the MLB All-Star Break. US Open to the British Open. And now, finally, the Senate confirmation hearings for Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan begin. Okay, most people don’t care. But we journalists must, and must understand the players and the stakes.

What Kagan did write

Sheila Liaugminas | 14 May 2010

Most jurists leave a paper trail for interrogators to examine in the confirmation process when judges are nominated for advancement. We found out quickly this week that Elaine Kagan, nominated for a lifetime appointment to the U.S. Supreme Court, had neither a judicial background nor a paper ‘trail’. But what little she wrote does provide a paperweight for senators preparing for the confirmation hearings.

Until Kagan is confirmed

Sheila Liaugminas | 12 May 2010

Senators will soon be involved in the confirmation hearings for Elena Kagan, President Obama’s nominee to replace Justice John Paul Stevens on the Supreme Court. It’s a lifetime appointment. Time to ask some good questions...