Yeomans Work: Don’t Forget the Third Branch

WASHINGTON, D.C., January 2, 2019 – In the latest edition of Yeomans Work, AFJ Senior Justice Fellow Bill Yeomans writes that the incoming House Judiciary Committee must focus on the crucial efforts to rescue the Supreme Court from partisan corruption.

“The Judiciary Committee must not allow the gargantuan task of checking this executive to prevent it from also attending to the health of the third branch,” writes Yeomans. “The past two years have demonstrated with chilling clarity that the rule of law and our democracy will not survive without a strong and independent judiciary.”

Yeomans calls for the Judiciary Committee to start with an investigation into the “many unresolved issues left by the Kavanaugh confirmation,” writing that the Committee “needs to learn the details behind the truncating of the FBI investigation into Dr. Blasey Ford’s sexual assault allegation and it needs to finish the investigation. The Committee also should complete other unfinished inquiries, such as how Kavanaugh was selected, who paid his six-figure debt shortly before his nomination, whether he was lending money for baseball tickets to attorneys who might appear before his court, and whether he lied to the Senate Judiciary Committee on matters ranging from the theft of Democratic Judiciary Committee memos to the meaning of entries in his high school yearbook to his conduct with Dr. Blasey Ford.”

Kavanaugh’s confirmation “also highlights the inadequacy of the Supreme Court’s recusal practices,” writes Yeomans. “Because justices are not required to explain their decisions whether or not to recuse, the law of recusal by justices is underdeveloped. That should change and, since the Court won’t, the Committee needs to lead the way.”

Yeomans Work focuses on the challenges to the justice system in the era of Trump. Bill Yeomans is available for media interviews. Contact Laurie Kinney, Communications Director, at laurie@afj.org or 202-464-7367.