With Breyer’s retirement, Clyburn says SC Judge Michelle Childs is Supreme Court ready
Rep. Jim Clyburn, the third-ranking Democrat in the U.S. House of Representatives and close ally to President Joe Biden, says South Carolina’s U.S. District Court Judge Michelle Childs of Columbia is ready for the U.S. Supreme Court.
“Judge Childs has everything it takes to be a great justice,” Clyburn said Thursday afternoon in a press conference for South Carolina reporters.
Biden will soon have his first chance as president to name someone to the Supreme Court, and that someone will be a Black woman, he said Thursday. Biden said he will announce his choice by the end of February.
News reports quoting sources broke the news on Wednesday that Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer, 83, would be retiring.
Breyer confirmed his retirement early Thursday afternoon in a joint press conference with President Biden. He will step down later this year.
In a press conference later Thursday with South Carolina reporters, Clyburn reminded reporters that Biden had pledged to nominate an African American woman to the U.S. Supreme Court if he were elected.
And Childs should be that woman, Clyburn said. “She would make a fantastic justice.”
Biden’s public pledge to nominate an African American woman came in a debate February 2020, right before the South Carolina Democratic presidential primary, in which Black voters make up a sizable demographic.
With overwhelming Black support, Biden proceeded to win the South Carolina primary — a crucial victory for the then-candidate, who had up to then lost three earlier primaries. Before the primary, Clyburn announced he would support Biden over other Democratic candidates — an endorsement many credit with convincing Black voters to give Biden the winning votes.
During his Thursday press conference, Clyburn — who has been appearing on numerous recent national television and cable shows promoting Childs, 55, as the best African American female candidate — gave a brief life history of Childs: born in Detroit, grew up in a single-parent blue collar family, moved to Columbia as a child and graduated from Columbia high school as student body president and valedictorian.
Although Childs, who graduated from University of South Carolina School of Law did not attend the elite law schools that most other justices attended, Clyburn said that background is a plus rather than a negative.
“I always say it is good for judges and other people in public offices to have the ability to empathize, which you cannot do, unless you have the experiences to understand what has gone on before you,” Clyburn said.
Moreover, said Clyburn, Biden likes to talk about his own non-elite background, which included going to public schools. “He talked about that as being what made him understanding of a lot of the issues that will come before him as president.”
Clyburn added, “We have to recognize that people come from all walks of life, have all kinds of experiences and we ought not dismiss anybody because of that.”
Biden in December, at Clyburn’s urging, nominated Childs to fill a vacancy on the prestigious and highly influential U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, often referred to as the D.C. Circuit Court— a federal bench often used as a launch pad for future Supreme Court justices
Childs’ hearing with the Senate Judiciary Committee for a seat on the D.C. Circuit Court was scheduled for Tuesday.
“I would hope that hearing on Feb. 1 will give the whole country the chance to look at who she is,” Clyburn said.
However, late Friday afternoon, Clyburn’s office confirmed news reports that said Childs’ hearing on Tuesday would be delayed indefinitely. The reports said the delay is because she is now on the White House shortlist of judges being considered for the Supreme Court.
Although Clyburn has Biden’s ear on this Supreme Court nomination, Childs’ actual chances are unclear.
Other African American female judges are said to be the front runners by legal scholars and reporters who cover legal matters. Those judges include U.S. Circuit Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson and California Supreme Court Justice Leondra Kruger.
Meanwhile, other South Carolina members of Congress are weighing in on the relatively rare event of a president having the opportunity to pick a Supreme Court justice.
“I appreciate Justice Breyer’s service to our nation. He has always been a scholar and a gentleman whose record on the Supreme Court is solidly in the liberal camp,” U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said in a statement Wednesday. “As to his replacement: If all Democrats hang together — which I expect they will — they have the power to replace Justice Breyer in 2022 without one Republican vote in support. Elections have consequences, and that is most evident when it comes to fulfilling vacancies on the Supreme Court.”
Clyburn told reporters that he has spoken with both Graham and South Carolina’s other senator, Republican Tim Scott, about Childs and both were “very complimentary.” However, in politics, favorable comments are not the same as a solid commitment of support.
The 100 senators in the U.S. Senate will be ones voting to confirm any Supreme Court justice. The Senate is evenly divided, 50-50, between Republicans and Democrats. Vice President Kamala Harris holds the tie-breaking vote.
Before becoming a state judge, Childs was a partner at a large law firm. She holds a degree from Duke University School of Law, an undergraduate degree from the University of South Florida and two degrees from the University of South Carolina School of Law and School of Business.
Colleagues described Childs last year in a profile as a judge with “30 years of experiences dealing with real clients, real plaintiffs, real trial lawyers and complex business, legal and other court dilemmas. She would be able to look at matters through a lens of humanity as well as the law’s cold black-letter prisms.”
Carl Tobias, a University of Richmond School of Law professor who studies federal judicial appointments, said Wednesday that Childs is a “very experienced” judge who has handled high profile cases.
Those cases include complex litigation involving the now-defunct SCANA $10 billion nuclear project business failure and voting rights matters. Childs also issued a major opinion upholding a South Carolina gay marriage as legal at a time when the state did not give recognition to such marriages.
Two other African-American judges — Jackson and Kruger — are probably getting the most consideration, Tobias said. “But maybe Childs is third. I think she has a good chance but she’s probably not a front-runner right now.”
Editor’s note: this story has been corrected to note the correct undergraduate university that Childs attended. It was the University of South Florida, not the University of Florida.
This story was originally published January 26, 2022 at 4:31 PM.
