Sen. Cory Booker announced at the start of Thursday’s Senate Judiciary Supreme Court confirmation hearing for Brett Kavanaugh that he would publicly release “committee confidential” documents.
“I am going to release the email about racial profiling. And I understand that the penalty comes with potential ousting from the Senate. And if Sen. Cornyn believes that I violated Senate rules, I openly invite and accept the consequences…the emails being withheld from the public have nothing to do with national security.”
The emails — from Kavanaugh’s time as a lawyer in the George W. Bush White House — include critical remarks about affirmative action regulations issued by the Department of Transportation.
The documents released by Booker include a batch of emails concerning racial profiling, affirmative action and other race-conscious government programs.
In a 2002 email, Kavanaugh writes that security procedures adopted in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks should ultimately be race-neutral, though he acknowledged that developing such procedures could take time. Others in the White House suggested racial profiling might be legally justified if it enhanced security.
Read the emails here:
Sens. Mazie Hirono, D-Hawaii, and Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., also released “confidential” documents, drawing a stern rebuke from Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, who called them “irresponsible and outrageous.”
Separately, The New York Times reported on leaked emails from the “confidential” file. One is an email drafted by Kavanaugh in 2003, in which he questioned whether the Supreme Court’s 1973 Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion should be described as “settled law of the land.”
Pressed on that email by Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., on Thursday, Kavanaugh explained he was simply summarizing views of legal scholars, not offering his own view.
On Wednesday, Kavanaugh said he understands the weight that many people attach to Roe. But he declined to say whether that case was properly decided.