Sen. Hee-Hawley has outdone himself this time. He’s attacking Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson with the entirely fabricated lie that she is “soft” on sex offenders, child pornographers in particular. See Glenn Kessler, Josh Hawley’s misleading attack on Judge Jackson’s sentencing of child-porn offenders and Ruth Marcus, How low will the GOP go in taking on Ketanji Brown Jackson? Josh Hawley lets us know.
And here’s Ian Millhiser, Josh Hawley’s latest attack on Ketanji Brown Jackson is genuinely nauseating, at Vox.
The senator’s misleadingaccusations can be broken down into three parts. First, he claims that a scholarly article that Jackson wrote while she was still a law student “questioned making convicts register as sex offenders.” In reality, the article examines a constitutional question that was unresolved in 1996, when Jackson published it: under what circumstances are laws that apply retroactively to convicted sex offenders permissible under the Constitution.
In other words, she wasn’t opposed to people having to register as sex offenders, she was asking a constitutional question. Jackson’s paper has been cited in real-world court cases. This includes a unanimous opinion by the Wyoming state supreme court.
The second prong of Hawley’s attack on Jackson is less of a factual allegation and more of an expression of incredulity. He criticized Jackson because, as a member of the Sentencing Commission, she once probed whether some child pornography offenses should be considered “less-serious” than others.
For example, one perpetrator in Jackson’s court was a teenager who shared some child porn with an undercover detective, but the psychologist who evaluated him decided the kid was just curious and not a pedophile. Jackson sentenced him to three months in prison and several months’ probation. But she sentenced an adult who was a sure-enough child pornographer to six years in prison.
The third prong of Hawley’s attack on Jackson appears to be literally true, but only because Hawley uses very precise wording — he claims that Jackson “deviated from the federal sentencing guidelines in favor of child porn offenders” in seven cases where she sentenced child pornographic offenders.
While Jackson did, indeed, sentence these seven offenders to less time in prison than these sentencing guidelines recommend, Hawley’s allegation leaves out some important context. The guidelines’ approach to most child pornography offenders is widely viewed as too draconian by a bipartisan array of judges, policymakers, and even some prosecutors.
According to a 2021 report by the US Sentencing Commission, “the majority (59.0%) of nonproduction child pornography offenders received a variance below the guideline range” when they were sentenced (“nonproduction” refers to offenders who view or distribute child pornography, but do not produce new images or videos). And, when judges do depart downward from the guidelines, they typically impose sentences that are more than 50 months lower than the minimum sentence recommended by the guidelines.
Indeed, guidelines sentences are so harsh that even many prosecutors advise judges not to follow them. As Berman, the sentencing law professor, notes in his own examination of nine child pornography cases heard by Judge Jackson, “in a majority of these cases (5 of 9) the prosecution advocated for a below-guideline sentence and in three others the prosecution advocated for only the guideline minimum.”
Hawley sits on the Senate Judiciary Committee, so he’s going to be asking question during Jackson’s confirmation hearing. In the next few days we’ll see the entire right-wing media infrastructure label Jackson a friend to child pornographers.
Judge Jackson is Black.
And Judge Jackson is a successful woman.
The fact that such a woman exists offends the sensibilities of the flowers of America's Southern, male youth.
"They're going to WHA…?!?!?!
Put her WHERE?!?!?!?"
It seems to me that Hawley fulfilling the expression, 'You dance with the one who brung ya'. If he is so concerned about Jackson being soft on sex offenders he should have remained silent and sprung the issue at the confirmation hearings, so as to catch her off guard if he felt there is a legitimate concern of the issue. It's apparent he's stroking his base with deeply emotionl issues directed at a black women. You'd think that with his Ivy League pedigree he'd be able to come up with an argument a little more complex than something the average Bubba would come up with. But than again, you have to communicate on a level your followers can understand. Basic racism.
Just an abstract thought… It could be a possibility that he's tilling the ground to knock Matt Gaetz out of the box if by chance they become contenders in a future political conest. It never hurts to cover your bases. Two birds with one stone?
Cheap and easy attacks that appeal to the shallow and stupid, dishonest takes and bad-faith arguments are what Republican do.
Pernicious prevarications are the red meat of the Putinistas branch of the Republican party, which is pretty much all of them these days.
Howl-ee can and will say anything he wants because he knows Moscow Mitch will prevent any real vote on Ketanji Brown Jackson. It is all part of the plan to "unpack" the court to the six current right wingers. Then they will have to get rid of Justice Roberts because he sometimes refers to the US Constitution and not the Republican right wing playbook (which seems to usually involve time travel lies so they can say "this is what the founding fathers really meant instead of that stilted and stentorian language they put in the US Constitution."
Do you think Justice Kavanaugh knows what stilted and stentorian means? Or pernicious and prevarication for that matter.
As long as Mowcow Mitch is the minority leader, he can't block a vote on Jackson. He could only block Supreme Court nominees while he was majority leader.
You are, of course, correct. BUT….. Manchin and Sinema have proven to be wildcards for Republican's nominal minority to feel like a brick wall majority.
My error in saying block the vote when I meant win the vote to prevent approval.
You have a much better insight to the winds of the senate, and I would love to hear that M&S are expected to be firmly behind approving the appointment.
I need some good news in the worst way.
"Smear" is the right word. It suggests the premeditation and intent of the accusation.
The narrative of the 'Q" crowd is that Democrats are organized pedophiles. There ARE Democrats who prey on children – it's not organized or defended by the party or by voters. (There are pedophile priests of several denominations – it's not policy of any Christian church.) There are Republican pedophiles – it's not the policy of the party or the voters.
The difference is that Democrats have not tried to make the failings of an individual pedophile associated with the GOP emblematic of the party. The "Q" crowd loves to make the accusation, regardless of how flimsy the basis may be.
All of this is purely preparatory for the 2022 election. The argument for Trump-sponsored candidates personal failings (wife-beating, etc) is that they are not pedophile Democrats.
Yes, that is the GOP party platform: since crime exists, the crimes of Trump are ok. It is like shrugging your shoulders and saying "I give up", I am gonna get my own no matter the cost because we live in a garbage dumpster (with lots of non-whites!), that is the way it is, and rationalize sloth with religion.
It appears that GOP is just happy as pie living in a garbage dumpster.
Perhaps if they would look at the teachings of Christ and see that the kingdom of heaven is available to us and not an entitlement just by saying the right words or incantations. Showing up with a fringed flag and all wont get you there. Donating $$$ or showing up at a megachurch and getting your endorphins pumped is not actively mitigating suffering and, imho, the megachurch is a public display of the seven deadly sins and not really a religious activity… more of a theme park and entertainment venue that leads to emptiness.