MSNBC "Andrea Mitchell Reports" - Transcript

Interview

MSNBC "Andrea Mitchell Reports" - Transcript

MSNBC "Andrea Mitchell Reports" Interview With Senator Charles Schumer (D-NY)

Subject: Sonia Sotomayor, President Obama's Supreme Court
Nominee

Interviewer: Andrea Mitchell

1:00 P.M. EDT, TUESDAY, MAY 26, 2009

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MS. MITCHELL: Let's go right to Democratic Senator Chuck Schumer who serves on the Judiciary Committee.

Senator, thanks so much for joining us. We appreciate that. I know this --

SEN. SCHUMER: Hi, Andrea.

MS. MITCHELL: -- is a busy day today.

SEN. SCHUMER: It is.

MS. MITCHELL: But let's talk about the history of this. She's a New Yorker. You are clearly the New York senator, one of the two New York senators who will be sponsoring her in front of the committee. What is the argument against her, the argument that she has been too activist --

SEN. SCHUMER: Well --

MS. MITCHELL: -- that she has talked about the Appeals Court --

SEN. SCHUMER: Yeah.

MS. MITCHELL: -- making law rather than following law?

SEN. SCHUMER: It's a pretty slim read. Clearly, she's legally excellent. Top of her class, Princeton and Yale, great record on the courts. She's a moderate. She's had some very tough-on-crime opinions. She has a great story and, of course, diversity as well, which is important, although I would say excellence and moderation come number one and number two.

So they don't have much to argue against. The thing they're pointing out is she said on the Court of -- you make policy on the Court of Appeals. But that's sort of -- the hard right put that out and it got on YouTube. But as typical of what they do, they cut off the next sentence where she said, "I don't believe in that view. I don't subscribe to that view."

Once the whole record comes out, it sort of pulls the rug out from under that argument because she said she doesn't agree with it.

MS. MITCHELL: Now, she's a former prosecutor. She's got years on the bench. At the same time, there were other candidates, perhaps Diane Wood, who are known for their legal brilliance. What makes her so special? Is it the, quote, "empathy factor" that the --

SEN. SCHUMER: Well --

MS. MITCHELL: -- president said was so important to him, real life experience?

SEN. SCHUMER: I think it's the combination. Clearly, she's brilliant legally. You don't graduate summa from Princeton, Yale Law Review. And you know how you get on Law Review, there's no politics, no personality involved. You write six or seven essays. You put a number at the top. And the professors and law review people who read those essays just pick a number. Number 23 was the best essays. Sotomayor gets on.

So she's brilliant. But the combination of the brilliance and the practical experience, I think, is unique. There's no one who has her life story on the Court. And that life story would be important whether she was black, white, from one country or another. I think Republicans will oppose her at their peril. It's very hard for a senator of either party to vote against her.

MS. MITCHELL: Well, already some Republicans, certainly some who have presidential ambitions, are talking very negatively. Let me read to you Mitt Romney, his comment today. "The nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court is troubling," he wrote. "Her public statements make it clear she has an expansive view of the role of the judiciary. Historically, the Court is where judges interpret the Constitution, and apply the law. It should never be the place," quote, "'where policy is made' as Judge Sotomayor has said." That was in reference --

SEN. SCHUMER: You know --

MS. MITCHELL: -- to the quote we were talking about, which was from a --

SEN. SCHUMER: Yeah.

MS. MITCHELL: -- colloquy at Duke University Law School in 2005.

SEN. SCHUMER: Yeah. Yeah.

MS. MITCHELL: Does Mitt Romney have a point?

SEN. SCHUMER: No, I don't think so. Mitt Romney is running for president. What he did last time, it didn't work. What he's doing this time is appealing to the hard right faction of the Republican Party.

And this is really -- I think, you know, in a certain sense, this is a referendum on the future of the Republican Party because she is a moderate. She's had a lot of experience. She does represent diversity. And they're going to have real trouble opposing her. And if they let the 5 percent at the extreme right oppose her and lead them to oppose her, it's going to hurt them.

The president -- Obama, to his credit, didn't choose a far out liberal. He chose someone who's a moderate who has some very tough opinions on -- for instance, on crime and on other issues like that. She's written some very strong, tough-on-crime opinions.

MS. MITCHELL: Now, let me quickly ask you before I let you go -- this just in, as they say. The California Supreme Court has just upheld Prop 8, the ban on gay unions, same-sex marriage. Now, I think there are at least 18,000 marriages that have already taken place. I know you've endorsed gay marriages. What should now happen? Is there anything that should be done at the federal level?

SEN. SCHUMER: Well, I don't know about the federal level because the majority of congressmen and senators have not supported gay marriage as of yet, although many of them have supported civil unions. I think this is going to continue to be litigated because you'd end up with two classes of people maybe -- people who were married at one time and people who were married at another time. So this is a(n) unfolding chapter.

The one thing I'd say, Andrea -- one of the great strains in America, one of the great strengths, we inexorably move towards equality. And that will happen on this issue as well.

MS. MITCHELL: All right. Chuck Schumer, I know it's a busy day --

SEN. SCHUMER: Thanks, Andrea.

MS. MITCHELL: -- for you. We really appreciate your joining us.

SEN. SCHUMER: Yes. Thanks.

END.

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