Trump meets with Supreme Court candidate

[corbe]

Trump meets with Supreme Court candidate

By VIVIAN SALAMA and JONATHAN LEMIRE
 
Jan. 17, 2017 5:18 PM EST
 


WASHINGTON (AP) — President-elect Donald Trump has met with one of the judges on his short list for potential Supreme Court nominees, less than two weeks before he is expected to announce his choice for the nation's highest court.

Judge William Pryor, an Alabama-based judge on the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, met with Trump in New York on Saturday, said two people familiar with the meeting. They spoke on condition of anonymity because the meeting had not been publicly announced.

Trump said last week that he would select a candidate to fill the seat of the late Justice Antonin Scalia within his first two weeks in office. He has promised to seek someone in the conservative's mold and said he is working from a list of 21 people, mainly conservative state and federal judges in their 50s.

For nearly a year, the court has had only eight justices, which means they can deadlock at 4-4 deadlock on decisions.

The likely confirmation of Trump's choice by a Republican-controlled Senate would restore a fifth vote for conservative outcomes in cases involving voting rights, the power of unions and in class-action lawsuits, lost with Scalia's death. Trump also has said he wants an abortion opponent on the bench, although it would take a second Trump appointee to bring about dramatic change on that issue.

Other potential Trump nominees include state Supreme Court judges Allison Eid of Colorado, Joan Larsen of Michigan, David Stras of Minnesota and Don Willett of Texas, and federal appellate judges Steven Colloton, Thomas Hardiman, Raymond Kethledge and Diane Sykes.

Trump hinted last February that he had two favorites on the list of 21, Pryor and Sykes, although there is no indication that he's made a final decision.

Many factors come into play in choosing a Supreme Court justice, including age and gender. Typically, presidents seek nominees who have the potential for a long tenure in the lifetime appointments, seeking nominees under 60 years old. Pryor is 54.

Trump's victory rewarded Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's strategy of refusing all year even to consider President Barack Obama's nomination of Judge Merrick Garland to take Scalia's seat. McConnell announced on the night that Scalia died that the vacancy should be filled not by Obama, but by the next president. The Kentucky Republican was criticized for his stance by Obama, other Democrats and many legal scholars.

Pryor also is a member of the U.S. Sentencing Commission, an independent agency that sets sentencing guidelines for the federal courts.

He was the Alabama's attorney general from 1997 to 2004. His predecessor in that job, Sen. Jeff Sessions, is Trump's pick for U.S. attorney general, and the two — both natives of the city of Mobile, are said to have a close working relationship.

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http://bigstory.ap.org/article/f96c27b46d3647988ecc8d8c35d5918a/trump-meets-supreme-court-candidate

[Frank Cannon]

How solid is this guy? I don't have the constitution to be Robertsed again.

[Hoodat]

Pryor is the judge who removed Chief Justice Roy Moore from the Alabama Supreme Court for disobeying an unconstitutional court order.

[corbe]

   This could mean that Trump is going to accept Counsel's advice, in this case Sessions, though still cautiously optimistic, this is a plus.

[corbe]

Potential U.S. Supreme Court nominee Bill Pryor won't attend inauguration

 Kent Faulk | kfaulk@al.com By  Kent Faulk | kfaulk@al.com   
 
Former Alabama Attorney General and federal appeals court judge William "Bill" Pryor, who is reportedly being considered by President-Elect Donald Trump to fill a vacancy on the U.s. Supreme Court, said Tuesday that he will not attend the inauguration.

Pryor, in response to a question from AL.com about whether he would be among other Alabamians at Trump's inauguration, stated he would not be attending.
Pryor did not elaborate as to why he would not attend and did not respond to questions regarding his meeting this past weekend with Trump regarding who Trump will nominate to replace the late U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, who died early last year.

Pryor, a circuit judge who is on U.S. 11th Circuit of Appeals, is reportedly among two people being considered for the court. The other is Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Diane Sykes.

Pryor, however, is thought to be the favorite of Trump's Attorney General-nominee, Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions.

Pryor, 54, is a Mobile native and Tulane Law School graduate. He served as Alabama's Attorney General from 1997-2004, becoming the youngest state AG in the U.S. In 2005, Pryor was nominated by President George W. Bush to the U.S. Court of Appeals and was appointed after a contentious hearing with the Senate Judiciary Committee.

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http://www.al.com/news/birmingham/index.ssf/2017/01/potential_us_supreme_court_nom.html

[Hoodat]

Three notable cases:

Common Cause/Georgia v. Billups
Pelphrey v. Cobb County
Zibtluda LLC v. Gwinnett County

Prior lined up on the right side on all three.  The first affirmed the right of Georgia to require photo ID for voting.  The second affirmed the right of the county to open county commission meetings with prayer.  The third affirms the right of the county to limit the placement of strip clubs. 

[Right_in_Virginia]

I think the Senate is going to recess at 4:00 pm on Thursday.  Can Zero slip through a recess appointment?

[libertybele]

I think the Senate is going to recess at 4:00 pm on Thursday.  Can Zero slip through a recess appointment?

I don't think so, the Senate isn't taking a recess; they are simply adjourning for the night.  From my understanding recess appointments can only happen when Congress is gone for a period of time.

[kevindavis007]

Pryor is the judge who removed Chief Justice Roy Moore from the Alabama Supreme Court for disobeying an unconstitutional court order.

Roy Moore was a attention whore..