Harvard Classmates Spar as Cruz Jabs Jackson at Senate Hearing

Senator Ted Cruz said he always had a “friendly and cordial” relationship with his former law school classmate, Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson. Then he attacked.

Cruz, who served on the Harvard Law Review with Jackson in the 1990s, accused her of embracing critical race theory and going easy on child-pornography offenders as a federal judge.

“Do you agree with this book that is being taught with kids that babies are racist?” Cruz asked, holding up a book he said was being taught to children at Georgetown Day School in Washington, D.C., where she serves on the board of trustees. Cruz said Georgetown Day School is “filled and overflowing with critical race theory.”

Ted Cruz during a confirmation hearing for Ketanji Brown Jackson in Washington, D.C., on March 22.

Photographer: Samuel Corum/Bloomberg

School officials did not immediately reply to requests for comment.

Jackson defended the school, which was founded in 1945 as an interracial school in still-segregated Washington and now charges more than $40,000 a year in tuition.

“Justice is at the core of the Georgetown Day School mission,” she said. “Every child is treated as having inherent worth and none are discriminated against because of race.”

WATCH: Supreme Court nominee Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson answers questions from Senator Ted Cruz on critical race theory during her confirmation hearing in Washington.

Source: Bloomberg

Jackson said that “no child should be made to feel as though they’re racist.” And she pushed back when he suggested that she was a longtime advocate of critical race theory, an academic theory that says any analysis of U.S. laws and policy must take into account how race and racism have shaped attitudes and institution.

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“It doesn’t come up in my work as a judge,” Jackson said. “It’s never something that I’ve studied or relied on, and it wouldn’t be something that I would rely on if I was on the Supreme Court.”

Ketanji Brown Jackson during the Senate hearing.

Photographer: Al Drago/Bloomberg

Cruz then turned to a chart that listed some of the sentences she had imposed on people convicted of having child pornography. Using a marker, he wrote down the percentage reduction from what prosecutors had proposed as a sentence.

“Do you believe the voice of the children is heard when 100% of the time you’re sentencing those in possession of child pornography to far below what the prosecutor’s asking for?” Cruz asked.

Jackson, who at times grew visibly frustrated, said Cruz’s chart didn’t take all the relevant factors into account, including Congress’ requirement that judges consider the individual circumstances of the defendant.

She later told another senator, Democrat Chris Coons of Delaware, that the sex-crime cases she had handled were “harrowing” and still gave her nightmares.

“The vulnerability, the isolation, these crimes are horrible and so I take them very seriously just as I did all of the crimes but especially crimes against children,” Jackson said.

--With assistance from Kelsey Butler.

To contact the reporter on this story:
Greg Stohr in Washington at gstohr@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story:
Elizabeth Wasserman at ewasserman2@bloomberg.net

Megan Scully

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