SC made Biden’s historic Supreme Court justice possible, DNC chair Jaime Harrison says
Democratic National Committee Chair Jaime Harrison credited his home state of South Carolina and its Democratic voters for the role both played in Ketanji Brown Jackson’s historic confirmation to the U.S. Supreme Court.
“Today proves once again that a Black woman can accomplish anything. She can be vice president of the United States. She can shape the future of our nation. And now, she will serve on the highest court in the land,” Harrison said to applause Thursday at S.C. Democratic Party headquarters in Columbia.
“And I’m proud,” Harrison continued, “that the reason why this happened is because of Democrats here in the great state of South Carolina.”
Harrison’s comments came hours after the Senate confirmed Jackson to the Supreme Court, with a 53-47 vote. All of the upper chamber’s Democrats voted for her, but Jackson also picked up some bipartisan support with three Republican votes.
That vote, Harrison said, wouldn’t have been possible without South Carolina Democrats first weighing in on who they wanted to see in the White House in 2020.
It was here in the Palmetto State where then-candidate Joe Biden promised on a Charleston debate stage that he would nominate a Black woman to the Supreme Court.
And it was here, in South Carolina, where first-in-the-South Democratic presidential primary voters overwhelmingly picked Biden to be their party’s nominee and are largely credited with helping Biden turn his 2020 presidential campaign around.
“Not only does the road to the White House go through South Carolina, apparently today has proven that the road to the Supreme Court also goes through South Carolina,” said Bre Maxwell, a DNC committeewoman for South Carolina.
Jackson will take her seat on the Supreme Court when Justice Stephen Breyer retires this summer. She joined Biden at the White House to watch the vote, and the two embraced as they watched as her confirmation vote came in.
Jackson’s confirmation to the nation’s highest court will not significantly affect the court’s 6-3 conservative majority.
Still, South Carolina Democrats celebrated the moment.
Richland County Democratic Party Chair Deyaska Sweatman said Jackson’s confirmation shows the American dream is still alive and that Black women are valued. Angela Clyburn Hannibal, the party’s political director and the daughter of Majority Whip James Clyburn, D-Columbia, called it “a proud moment.”
But the press conference soon shifted to politics.
Trav Robertson, the S.C. Democratic Party chairman, said he hopes the vote will be a reminder that South Carolina’s two Republican U.S. senators did not vote to confirm Jackson.
“I hope,” Robertson said, “that the three women running against Tim Scott will remind him every day that he had an opportunity to vote for a strong African American woman to the bench and he did not.”
Then Harrison, who unsuccessfully ran against U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham in 2020, took aim at the state’s senior senator. Harrison noted that Graham voted for Jackson three different times but is now “pretending that she’s some radical.”
“Today, our two United States senators were on the wrong side of history,” Harrison said.
In explaining their votes against Jackson, Graham and Scott cited concerns about her judicial philosophy, saying she had a record of “judicial activism” that they could not support.
“The historic nature of Judge Jackson’s nomination reinforces the progress our country has made,” Scott said in his statement. “However, ideology must be the determining factor — not identity — when considering such an important lifetime appointment.”
Despite Graham and Scott’s opposition, Harrison called Jackson’s confirmation “a day of joy.”
“During those hearings, they called Judge Jackson everything but a child of God. But you know what they’re going to be calling her now?” Harrison asked.
“Madam Justice,” Harrison and Robertson said in unison.
This story was originally published April 7, 2022 at 5:16 PM.
