‘A Bridge Too Far?’ Tom Cotton Pressed on Fox News for Claiming Ketanji Brown Jackson Might’ve Defended Nazis
Senator Tom Cotton (R-AR) was questioned on Fox News for claiming Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson would’ve defended Nazis at the Nuremberg Trials.
As Cotton spoke Tuesday against Jackson’s confirmation on the Senate floor, he condemned her for legally representing suspected terrorists over the course of her career as a federal public defender. After claiming Jackson has “shown real interest in helping terrorists,” he brought up former Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson in order to claim “the last Judge Jackson left the Supreme Court to go Nuremberg and prosecute the case against the Nazis. This Judge Jackson might’ve gone there to defend them.”
Cotton’s claims were met with outrage, which Fox News’ John Roberts alluded to when he spoke to Cotton on Wednesday.
“She was in the federal public defenders’ office,” Roberts said. “She did not get to pick and choose her clients. This really is a matter of due process, and I’m wondering, why make that link between Judge Jackson and the Nazis and the Nuremberg Trial?”
Cotton answered by saying Jackson defended one Guantanamo Bay detainee in private practice after representing them in her public defender capacity. He continued to say Jackson had “three cases in which she voluntarily advocated for the terrorists at Guantanamo Bay in which she accused American soldiers of committing war crimes. I frankly have no patience for it.”
Cotton’s remarks gloss over the context that Jackson was representing Gitmo prisoners who were accusing the U.S. government of torture and unjustly detaining them. The Associated Press previously noted “Jackson actually never referred to anyone as a war criminal, but she did allege that the treatment of the detainees constituted torture and violated federal law. The brief she helped write said the federal government, including [former President George W. Bush] and [former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld], was ultimately responsible.”
Roberts didn’t challenge Cotton on this, but he continued his questioning by asking “so you don’t think it was a bridge too far to make the link with Nuremberg and Nazis?”
“No,” Cotton answered. “In three separate cases, she was representing — not American citizens charged with a crime entitled to due process and the Constitution — foreign territories who had committed acts of violence against Americans. Again, these are not American citizens entitled to due process in a court of law. They are foreign terrorists in three cases that she voluntarily advocated for, in which, she accused American soldiers of being war criminals.”
Watch above, via Fox News.
