Jim Brown –OneNewsNow
Failure with Dawn Johnsen is prelude to Supreme Court battle
The head of a group that advocates for constitutionalist judicial nominees says although President Obama is likely to appoint a liberal replacement for Supreme Court Justice David Souter,he runs the risk of a failed nomination if his pick is an outspoken advocate of same-sex marriage,partial-birth abortion,and gun control.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid admitted last week that he does not have the 60 votes needed to confirm Dawn Johnsen as head of the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel. Johnsen served 15 years as counsel of the radical abortion group NARAL,and was the lead author of a legal brief that claimed that limits on abortion constitute “reducing pregnant women to no more than fetal containers.”She has also said that “progressives must not portray all abortions as tragedies.”
Curt Levey,executive director of the Committee for Justice,says the stalled Johnsen nomination should send President Obama the message that he does not have a free hand to appoint someone “extreme”to the Supreme Court,even when there are 59 or 60 Democrats in the Senate.