The Senate is poised to confirm Daniel Collins to a lifetime appointment to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit later today. Lisa Cylar Barrett, Policy Director at the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. (LDF), released the following statement:
“Mere days after the 65th anniversary of the Supreme Court’s unanimous decision in Brown v. Board of Education, the Senate is poised to confirm yet another nominee who refused to endorse the seminal ruling. Last week, we highlighted how allowing this outrageous stance to become normalized and accepted in the judiciary presents enormous danger both to civil rights and the rule of law. We remain deeply disappointed that the Senate is dishonoring such a core component of American democracy, and our commitment to fighting for the Brown decision and all the progress that flowed from it does not end because the anniversary has passed. We are steadfast in our calls for Senators to vote no on nominees like Daniel Collins, who use Brown as an opportunity to sound a judicial dog whistle rather than affirming its watershed articulation of equality under the law.
“Additionally, this nominee is being advanced over the objection of both home-state senators. This departure from past Senate norms should concern all Americans as it exemplifies the extreme breakdown in the process used for lawmakers to meet their constitutional responsibility to ‘advise and consent’ on judicial nominees.”
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Founded in 1940, the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. (LDF) is the nation’s first civil and human rights law organization and has been completely separate from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) since 1957—although LDF was originally founded by the NAACP and shares its commitment to equal rights. LDF’s Thurgood Marshall Institute is a multi-disciplinary and collaborative hub within LDF that launches targeted campaigns and undertakes innovative research to shape the civil rights narrative. In media attributions, please refer to us as the NAACP Legal Defense Fund or LDF.
