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Senate Committee to Consider Supreme Court Nominee March 21


Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, who is a U.S. Circuit Judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, poses for a portrait, Feb. 18, 2022, in her office conference room at the court in Washington.
Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, who is a U.S. Circuit Judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, poses for a portrait, Feb. 18, 2022, in her office conference room at the court in Washington.

Senate confirmation hearings for Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson will begin March 21 and end March 24, the Senate Judiciary Committee announced Wednesday.

"As I have said from the time that Justice Breyer announced his retirement, the Committee will undertake a fair and timely process to consider Judge Jackson’s nomination," Senate Judiciary Committee Chair Dick Durbin, D-Ill., wrote. "I look forward to Judge Jackson’s appearance before the Committee and to respectful and dignified hearings."

If approved by the Senate, the current federal appellate judge will make history as the first Black woman to sit on the country’s top court.

At her 2021 confirmation hearing for the appellate court, she said, “I’ve experienced life in perhaps a different way than some of my colleagues because of who I am, and that might be valuable — I hope it would be valuable if I was confirmed."

During the 2020 presidential campaign, U.S. President Joe Biden promised to nominate an African American woman to the highest court.

Jackson, a liberal whose nomination is supported by progressive groups, would replace another liberal, Justice Stephen Breyer, who intends to retire at the end of the current Supreme Court term.

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