Fallon criticized Katyal, a associate at Hogan Lovells who served as appearing solicitor basic in the course of the Obama administration, for repr
Fallon criticized Katyal, a associate at Hogan Lovells who served as appearing solicitor basic in the course of the Obama administration, for representing Nestlé in oral arguments earlier than the Supreme Court docket on Tuesday. The case revolves round whether or not Nestlé and Cargill needs to be held answerable for their African suppliers allegedly utilizing baby slaves.
Fallon additionally faulted Frederick, a associate at Kellogg Hansen Todd Figel & Frederick who served within the solicitor basic’s workplace in the course of the Clinton administration, for submitting a Supreme Court docket transient final month on behalf of BP, Chevron, ExxonMobil and different oil firms in a local weather change case.
“The Biden administration’s prime lawyer needs to be somebody who is not cozying as much as these varieties of particular pursuits,” he mentioned.
And he went in any case three attorneys for defending Trump’s Supreme Court docket picks — Neil Gorsuch in Katyal and Frederick’s case, Brett Kavanaugh in Blatt’s — and giving them essential cowl from Democrats in the course of the battles over their nominations.
Blatt, who spent greater than a decade working within the solicitor basic’s workplace and is now the chair of Williams & Connolly’s Supreme Court docket and appellate apply, declined to remark. So did Katyal and Frederick.
Fallon, a former Justice Division spokesperson in the course of the Obama administration and aide to Senate Minority Chief Chuck Schumer, began Demand Justice in 2018 to counter the affect of conservative authorized advocacy teams such because the Judicial Disaster Community. The group has pressed Democrats to vote in opposition to Trump’s judicial nominees and graded them on their data. Fewer than half of Democratic senators acquired As or Bs — and Schumer wasn’t amongst them.
The group’s aggressive techniques — resembling operating adverts criticizing Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.) for voting for a few of Trump’s judicial nominees — have irritated some Democratic senators. Fallon defended the adverts, saying Coons had nothing to fret about it if he was pleased with his file.
As soon as Trump leaves workplace, Demand Justice will shift to urgent Biden to nominate “essentially the most progressive judges — with extra professionally numerous backgrounds than we noticed from Clinton and Obama judges — and preventing for his or her affirmation,” Fallon wrote in an e mail to POLITICO. The group may even proceed its work to influence Democratic voters to make judges and the courts a precedence and to construct progressive judicial infrastructure within the states.
Demand Justice advised seven Black ladies whom Biden might faucet as solicitor basic, together with Leondra Kruger, who served within the solicitor basic’s workplace in the course of the Obama administration and is now a California Supreme Court docket justice; Sherrilyn Ifill, who leads the NAACP Authorized Protection Fund; and one among Ifill’s colleagues on the Authorized Protection Fund, Janai Nelson.
The solicitor basic put up has been a stepping stone to the Supreme Court docket previously.
President Lyndon Johnson tapped Thurgood Marshall as his solicitor basic in 1965 earlier than nominating him as a Supreme Court docket justice two years later. He was the primary Black American to serve in both function. President Barack Obama nominated Elena Kagan, the one lady to function solicitor basic, to the Supreme Court docket a yr after tapping her as solicitor basic.
Jeff Hauser, the director of the Revolving Door Mission and a thorn in Biden’s facet on government department nominations, mentioned he would like a lawyer within the mould of Kruger or Ifill change into solicitor basic moderately than a lawyer from an enormous agency.
“It will be nice to return to a world the place the NAACP Authorized Protection Fund is a option to transfer up the ranks and finally make it to the Supreme Court docket like Thurgood Marshall did,” Hauser mentioned.