Obama Is Serious About Nominating Srinivasan To Scotus

[siru]

President Obama seems to be making good his pledge to nominate a Supreme Court justice. Apparently, he has interviewed three candidates for the job: Chief Judge Merrick Garland and Judge Sri Srinivasan from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, and Judge Paul Watford from the 9th Circuit.

Nominating an Asian American such as Srinivasan would be momentous, as we’ve written elsewhere, especially considering the Supreme Court’s checkered history with Asian immigrants.

A number of observers have already noted some of the reasons Srinivasan would be an excellent nominee. He’s 49, and therefore, if confirmed, would be likely to shape the court’s direction for decades. He was confirmedunanimously (97-0, with 3 not voting) to the D.C. Circuit in 2013, including yes votes from such an unlikely set of supporters as Sens. Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, and Bernie Sanders. This unanimity is all the more remarkable for the D.C. Circuit, which is widely considered the “farm team” for the Supreme Court and is often subject to contentious nomination fights.

Other political considerations favor Srinivasan among the three recently interviewed justices. Many Senate Republicans would find it difficult to oppose Srinivasan, even more so than Garland, who has built a 20-year history of judicial decisions in the D.C. Circuit, or Watford, who hails from the liberal 9th Circuit.

By contrast, Srinivasan worked for the Bush administration and on behalf of corporate clients such as Enron and Exxon. Before that, he clerked for Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, a Reagan appointee, who would advocate on his behalf. (She recently said that the Senate should just “get on with it” and fill the court vacancy, and she has supported Srinivasan before).

[siru]

Must be a very deserving candidate to be considered for such a powerful job that can shape the USA