The final day of Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson’s U.S. Supreme Court confirmation hearings was largely what the previous three days led us to expect: testimony from the American Bar Association and from Jackson’s supporters detailing her brilliant legal mind and sparkling character, contrasted with conservative cultural warriors attempting to smear her by association on push-button racist and QAnon-adjacent charges of being “soft on crime,” a friend to pedophiles, a virtual abortionist, and a critical race theory proponent. For the most part, the witnesses on each side got to tell their stories and the proceeding went as expected.
Except for something Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) just couldn’t let go. The Republican minority on the committee had invited Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall to testify to the “soft on crime” part of the Jackson smear. It shouldn’t be lost on anyone that an elected Republican from Alabama should be brought in to testify against the confirmation of the nation’s first Black woman Supreme Court nominee, but that wasn’t the most egregious part of his appearance.
No, the really gobsmacking part of it is that Marshall can be counted among the insurrectionists of Jan. 6. And that Marshall refused, given multiple opportunities by Whitehouse, to agree that President Joe Biden is the “duly elected and lawfully serving president of the United States of America.” There’s a lot of critical background to this story, but first, watch this exchange.
Several times, Whitehouse asked: “Is Joseph R. Biden of Delaware the duly elected and lawfully serving president of the United States of America?” and Marshall refused to say more than: “He’s the president of this country.” Finally Whitehouse asked, “Are you answering that omitting the language ‘duly elected and lawfully serving’ purposely?” Marshall replied: “I’m answering the question. He is the president of the United States.”
Before this exchange, Whitehouse asked Marshall about his involvement in the Jan. 6 insurrection. That’s because Marshall served as chairman of the Rule of Law Defense Fund (RLDF), the dark-money policy arm of the Republican Attorneys General Association (RAGA). You remember RAGA—the group that helped organize the insurrection. The RLDF, a “nonprofit” set up by the RAGA, appeared in a list of groups “Participating in the March to Save America” along with Stop the Steal, Turning Point Action, Tea Party Patriots, and others.
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On the eve of the Jan. 6 riot, RLDF sent out a robocall to activists saying: “The march to save America is tomorrow in Washington, D.C., at the Ellipse in President’s Park between E Street and Constitution Avenue on the south side of the White House, with doors opening at 7:00 AM.” That was making sure everyone knew where to go. It gets more incriminating: “At 1:00 PM, we will march to the Capitol building and call on Congress to stop the steal,” the call continued. “We are hoping patriots like you will join us to continue to fight to protect the integrity of our elections.”
This robocall was coming from the Republican state attorneys general, the people elected to uphold and enforce the rule of law. Republicans picked Marshall—the person most directly responsible for that call—to come testify in the Senate Judiciary Committee against President Biden’s nominee, the first Black woman to hold that honor.
The revelation of that robocall led to the resignation of one of RAGA’s top officials. Marshall remains head of the RLDF, and has remained under scrutiny by the Alabama Political Reporter for allegations that Marshall has used his office and state computers to communicate with and conduct business for the political RAGA. The paper has been attempting to obtain emails sent between Marshall’s state office and the current and former staff of RAGA or the RLDF before the Jan. 6 riot and immediately after.
Additionally, Marshall has refused to say where he was on Jan. 6. Marshall was among the attorneys general who signed on to a frivolous and failed lawsuit filed by disgraced Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton in an attempt to overturn the results of the election. He was in a Dec. 9, 2020 meeting in the White House with several other of the Republican attorneys general involved in that effort, and on Dec. 11 tweeted a photo of himself standing alongside Trump.
“One of the things we hope, with 17 of our colleagues coming together is that the court understands the significant importance of this,” Marshall said Fox News on Dec. 10. “All we’ve asked is that only legal ballots be counted. Texas has presented a very compelling argument that compels the court to take this case moving forward, and we’re to support the fact that this needs to be considered.”
Marshall has denied knowledge of the robocall that the group he leads sent out. He denied that in his exchange with Whitehouse Thursday. He denied knowing about any of the dark money received by his group that would have paid for that call.
That goes along with his refusal to acknowledge that President Biden is the “duly elected and lawful” president of the U.S. And that’s who Republicans chose to have testify.
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