Grassley on 10th Circuit Nominee: I think mainstream, commonsense Westerner is the perfect way to describe Justice Eid
Prepared Floor
Statement by Senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa
Chairman,
Senate Judiciary Committee
On the
Nomination of Justice Allison Eid to Serve on the 10th U.S. Court of
Appeals
November 1,
2017
Tomorrow
morning, the Senate will vote on the nomination of Colorado Supreme Court
Justice Allison Eid, to serve on the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals.
She is an eminently qualified and exceptional nominee who has received
widespread bipartisan praise and support.
Justice
Eid has spent over a decade on the Colorado Supreme Court. Before her
appointment, she served as the Colorado State Solicitor General. In that role,
she represented the State before both federal and state courts. She also served
as a tenured faculty member at the University of Colorado School of Law, where
she taught courses in Constitutional Law, Legislation, and Torts. Justice Eid
also practiced commercial and appellate litigation at Arnold and Porter.
At
the beginning of her legal career, Justice Eid served as a clerk for Judge
Jerry Smith on the Fifth Circuit and as a law clerk for Supreme Court Justice
Clarence Thomas.
Justice
Eid was raised by a single mother who Eid credits for her significant personal
and professional achievements. She earned a scholarship to Stanford and
graduated with distinction and as a member of Phi Beta Kappa. Justice Eid
received her law degree from the University of Chicago, where she graduated
with high honors and Order of the Coif. She has had an impressive legal career
and an impressive life story.
In
her long and celebrated tenure on the Colorado Supreme Court, Justice Eid has
heard roughly 900 cases and written approximately 100 opinions. In 2008, 75% of
Colorado voters retained Justice Eid to the Colorado Supreme Court.
Her
nomination has also received wide bipartisan support. For example, Justice
Eid’s former clerks, who noted that they “come from a diverse set of
geographic, economic, cultural, and political backgrounds” wrote a letter to
the Judiciary Committee supporting her nomination. Judges work closely with
their law clerks every day. Law clerks understand a judge’s deliberative
process and approach to the law better than anyone. And how did these clerks
describe Justice Eid?
They
said “she never fails to provide her full attention and dedication to each
individual case, mastering the relevant facts and carefully analyzing the law,
whether the text of a statute or the word of a contract.”
Her
law clerks also wrote that she goes “where the law takes her” and in their
decade of collective experience in over 900 cases, Justice Eid “treats each
case individually without any preconceived notion of desired outcome.”
The
National Native American Bar Association also endorsed Justice Eid. In their
letter to the Committee they noted that she “has demonstrated deep
understanding of federal Indian law and policy matters, as well as significant
respect for tribes as governments. Such qualities and experiences are rare
among nominees to the federal bench.”
They
went on to note that “while we do not expect that Justice Eid will agree with
tribal interests on every issue, we also believe that she is immensely well
qualified and we are confident that Justice Eid is a mainstream, commonsense
Westerner who will rule fairly on Indian Country matters.”
I
think mainstream, commonsense Westerner is the perfect way to describe Justice
Eid.
Despite
this bipartisan support and her professional achievements, all the Democratic
members of the Judiciary Committee voted against her nomination in Committee,
and I suspect most in the minority will vote against her confirmation today.
That
surprised me. Justice Eid received a majority well-qualified rating from the
American Bar Association, an outside group who evaluates judicial nominees.
My
colleagues claim that this group’s ratings weigh very heavily in their decision
to support or oppose a judicial nominee.
In
fact, my Democratic colleagues claim that these ratings should carry a great
deal of weight with the Senate and argue the Judiciary Committee shouldn’t hold
hearings on nominees who have not yet received ABA ratings.
But
this week, we are voting on four circuit court nominees, including three women,
who received well-qualified ratings from the ABA. The ABA rated two of these
individuals unanimously well-qualified. Yet the vast majority of my Democratic
colleagues voted against the two nominees on whom we have already voted. And I’m
willing to bet that the other two nominees will see similar opposition from my
Democratic colleagues.
So
why do my Democratic friends profess such admiration for the ABA’s evaluation
process and then vote against nominees who receive a well-qualified rating? I’d
like to see them put their money where their mouth is. If my colleagues believe
so strongly in the ABA’s evaluations, they should start voting for nominees who
receive well-qualified ratings.
But
again, I suspect they will not. When the Judiciary Committee voted on Justice
Eid’s nomination, my Democratic colleagues really stretched to find reasons to
oppose her nomination.
One
of the chief reasons given for opposition of her nomination centered on a quote
in a Denver Post article that said Justice Eid has “earned a reputation of one
of [the Colorado Supreme Court’s] most conservative members.”
I
find that statement to be misleading. Of the seven justices on the Colorado
Supreme Court, Justice Eid is one of only two justices appointed by a Republican
Governor. To argue that she is somehow extreme just because she was not
appointed by a Democratic Governor is unfair.
Furthermore,
the Denver Post published a subsequent article that disagreed with this
characterization. By contrast, the more recent article stated, “appointment by
a Republican or Democrat does not always dictate the ideology of the justice…
even categorizing justices as either conservative or liberal is generally an
issue.”
I
would agree with Denver Post on this point. Justice Eid should not be evaluated
by her “ideological reputation,” but rather her judicial approach. That is how
I have evaluated Justice Eid and other judicial nominees and that is why I
strongly support her confirmation today.
I’m
very proud to support the nomination of Justice Allison Eid. She is the third
in a series of distinguished female circuit court nominees that we’ve had the
opportunity to vote on this week. Her impressive experience and numerous
accomplishments speak to her qualification for this role. I commend the
President for nominating these outstanding and accomplished women to our
circuit courts. Justice Eid is an exceptional nominee and her record
overwhelmingly supports her nomination. As a result, I’ll support her
confirmation tomorrow and I urge all of my colleagues to do the same.
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