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Jewish reactions to Trump’s nomination of Neil Gorsuch

[additional-authors]
February 1, 2017
Neil Gorsuch at the White House on Jan. 31. Photo by Kevin Lamarque/Reuters

From Jewish Insider’s Daily Kickoff.

“President Donald Trump on Tuesday tapped Judge Neil Gorsuch for the Supreme Court, elevating a 49-year-old judge who has served on a federal appeals court for more than a decade to replace the late Justice Antonin Scalia… Gorsuch’s past rulings give conservatives confidence that Gorsuch is a strong supporter of religious freedom rights. Last September, he joined a dissent arguing that requirements for contraception coverage in Obamacare ran roughshod over the rights of religious nonprofits.” [Politico]

What We’re Hearing Through The Grapevine — Judge Gorsuch is good friends with Ken Mehlman, Bush 43’s campaign manager in 2004 and former Chair of the RNC, who is also a prominent Republican LGBT activist. Gorsuch and Mehlman attended Harvard Law School together, along with future President Barack Obama. In fact, Mehlman tweeted“Congrats to my former HLS housemate and forever friend Neil Gorsuch on SCOTUS nomination. Neil is a fair minded gentleman and scholar.”

We’re also hearing that Judge Gorsuch visited Israel on an exchange trip this past fall and considers himself a friend of Israel. We’re still gathering additional details on that trip…

Gorsuch’s HLS classmate Norm Eisen emails us: “He is a fine person, and although I don’t agree with his judicial philosophy across the board, an exceptionally talented judge. He was confirmed unanimously for the circuit and he would have sailed through again, but for the fact that the GOP changed everything in wrongly rejecting Garland. That was a senatorial coup. Democratic leadership in the Senate, and all of us Democrats, need to decide what the consequences for that illegitimate action should now be. It is terrible that the Senate majority’s misconduct put a cloud over my classmate and an otherwise outstanding nominee.” 

INBOX — Rabbi Jonah Dov Pesner of the RAC: “We are concerned by the nomination of Judge Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court… We are greatly troubled by Judge Gorsuch’s record, which suggests that he may not have the attributes and values a nominee to the Supreme Court ought to have in order to mete out justice and interpret the laws that affect us all. We look forward to engaging in the confirmation process to further evaluate Judge Gorsuch’s views on issues of core importance to the Reform Movement, including civil rights, separation of church and state, religious freedom, women’s rights, LGBTQ equality, and many more.” 

Orthodox Union’s Nathan Diament: “While there is more of Judge Gorsuch’s record to be reviewed, we are very encouraged by his record in religious liberty cases – the area of Constitutional law of paramount concern to the Orthodox Jewish community. His opinions in cases such as Hobby Lobby and American Atheists v Davenport show a jurisprudential approach that venerates religious conscience and pluralism in American society.” 

David Frum: “Everyone’s going to enjoy the Gorsuch debate, because it’s the kind of debate you would have if things were normal” [Twitter]

Yair Rosenberg: “Here’s the thing: a principled small government states’ rights jurist is really the best liberals could hope for in era of Trump overreach” [Twitter]

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