Democratic lawmakers Wednesday expressed deep reservations about the refusal of President Donald Trump’s choice of top Supreme Court advocate and other Department of Justice nominees to explicitly state that the administration will comply with court orders.
During a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing Wednesday, members of the minority bristled against comparisons that D. John Sauer, Trump’s pick for solicitor general, drew between the administration’s derision for recent court orders against its policies and historical Supreme Court rulings like Korematsu v. United States, which upheld the internment of Japanese citizens during World War II.
“You’re going to some of the worst cases in our nation like Korematsu,” said Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.). “This would really create a constitutional crisis in this American context in which we’re living in right now where courts impose injunctions that restrict or compel government action and then government officials go against that.”
The hearing, during which the committee vetted Sauer and two Trump appointees to serve as assistant U.S. attorneys general, follows a string of temporary restraining orders and preliminary injunctions that have blocked the administration’s pause on federal funds and loans.
