OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.
The wait to see who the Supreme Court nominee of President Joe Biden is about to come to an end.
Sources at the White House have said that the president is down to three candidates and he is set to announce his nominee by Monday, NBC News reported.
He has interviewed the three finalists, who are all black women, and they are federal judges Ketanji Brown Jackson, J. Michelle Childs, and California Supreme Court Justice Leondra Kruger.
Deputy White House Press Secretary Andrew Bates told NBC News Tuesday that Biden “continues to evaluate eminently qualified individuals in the mold of Justice Breyer who have the strongest records, intellect, character, and dedication to the rule of law that anyone could ask for.”
All of the possible candidates are “deserving of bipartisan support,” Bates said.
“The President has not yet chosen a nominee,” he said. “He continues to evaluate eminently qualified individuals in the mold of Justice Breyer who have the strongest records, intellect, character, and dedication to the rule of law that anyone could ask for – and all of whom would be deserving of bipartisan support. He looks forward to announcing a nominee this month.”
The president’s team is contacting liberal groups to urge them to support the pick and p[rotect her from attacks.
“We’re close,” White House Office of Public Engagement Director Cedric L. Richmond said on a Sunday night during a video conference with members the group Win With Black Women, The Washington Post reported.
“We know what some of the attacks are going to be: not qualified, affirmative action pick,” he said to the group. “Well, it wasn’t ‘affirmative action pick’ when we just picked friends, White friends of the president, for all these decades. You know, it was just patronage or whatever they wanted to call it.”
Those attacks may come from the fact that the president declared he would not consider anyone other than a black woman for the job.
“When we’re going to have to make some calls right when the president makes his mind up, before he announces it to the public, the unfortunate part is we won’t have the ability to call each and everybody on this phone,” he said. “And so what I would ask for is just the latitude and you all give us the wiggle room to maybe just call two or three people that can disseminate this widely.”
But if the president really wants bipartisan support his best pick could be Judge Childs who, it appears, has the support of Republican South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham.
“I can’t think of a better person for President Biden to consider for the Supreme Court than Michelle Childs. She has wide support in our state. She’s considered to be a fair minded, highly gifted jurist. She’s one of the most decent people I’ve ever met. It would be good for the court to have somebody who’s not at Harvard or Yale. She’s a graduate of the University of South Carolina, a public education background. She’s been a workers comp judge. She’s highly qualified. She’s a good character. And we’ll see how she does if she’s nominated. But I cannot say anything bad about Michelle Childs. She is an awesome person,” he said on the CBS News show “Face The Nation” last month.
Host Margaret Brennan asked the senator if that meant he would be a “yes” vote if she is the nominee.
“If she’s nominated, she will not be treated like Judge Kavanaugh, I promise you, by Republicans. Let’s see how she does at the hearing. But I think I’ve made it pretty clear that I’m a big admirer of Judge Charles. And I’d like to see the court have- a have a lot more balance, some common sense on it. Everybody doesn’t have to be from Harvard, Yale– It’s okay to go to a public university and get your law degree,” he said.
