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Confirmation Hearings For Sonia Sotomayor Begin; Interview With Texas Senator John Cornyn
Aired July 13, 2009 - 15:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: And that's day one of the confirmation hearing for Sonia Sotomayor to become an associate justice of the United States Supreme Court. You just heard the chairman, Patrick Leahy, the Democrat from Vermont, say the session will resume tomorrow, 9:30 a.m. Eastern. That's when the questioning will begin. All 19 senators, 12 Democrats, seven Republicans, will have 30 minutes in the first round of uninterrupted questions for Sonia Sotomayor, and then they will have a second round.
Each of those 19 senators will have 20 minutes of questions, uninterrupted. And, if necessary, they will go on to a third round, presumably the next day, 10 minutes of questions for each of those senators.
She's going to be in the hot seat literally throughout tomorrow and much of Wednesday as well.
Let's bring in some of our analysts and reporters to assess what happened on this day.
We learned a great deal, Gloria, about how the Republicans are getting ready to grill her.
GLORIA BORGER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Yes.
I think we saw the ideological divide on this committee. I think that they are making the case that she should not be confirmed because she couldn't be impartial, because she has too much empathy, and she wants to make law, not adhere to the law.
Today, in her statement, though, just now, she said that her judicial philosophy is very simple. It is fidelity to the law and that would not be her job. However, she understands the human consequences of what she does.
BLITZER: And she didn't really get into some of the more controversial parts. She spoke in general terms in a rather brief opening statement, Jeff Toobin.
JEFFREY TOOBIN, CNN SENIOR ANALYST: She did.
And if I could just offer one thought about today, the striking thing to me is what I didn't hear. I didn't hear one senator mention gay rights. Gay rights are very controversial. The Republicans have used it as a threat, the Democrats generally as a promise. Both sides stayed away from it. And I thought that was...
(CROSSTALK)
BLITZER: You're referring specifically to same-sex marriage?
TOOBIN: Same-sex marriage, but the subject of gay rights in general, but particularly same-sex marriage.
BLITZER: I suppose it will come up. These guys have a lot of time on their hands to ask a lot of questions.
What struck you, Maria Echaveste?
MARIA ECHAVESTE, FORMER CLINTON DEPUTY WHITE HOUSE CHIEF OF STAFF: I think that her statement about applying -- being faithful to the law was her opening shot to the Republican senators who have said to her today that they didn't think she would be impartial, that they thought she would substitute her experience.
And she straight on said, those experiences help me listen and understand.
So, I think, tomorrow, we are going to get into it.
Alex Castellanos, what struck me was the difference between some of these Republican senators. There are seven Republican senators. On the one hand, Jeff Sessions was very firm, but Lindsey Graham of South Carolina he took a different stance.
ALEX CASTELLANOS, CNN POLITICAL CONTRIBUTOR: He did. He took kind of an old-school Republican stance, which is that a president has a right to have his nominee, that elections have consequences.
But even the Republicans who took on Sotomayor on these issues were civil in tone and took her on, on issues and nothing personal or character. So, I think we can expect a different debate. And I think we saw a little of the Obama administration's strategy here, which is, Sonia, no gambling in this casino, no risk. We have got 60 votes. You are going to be the moderate judge. You are going to be reasonable. Don't give the Republicans really anything to chew on here.
BLITZER: Because he said flatly that she's going to be confirmed, barring some major disaster, Candy Crowley. And we're talking about Lindsey Graham.
(CROSSTALK)
CANDY CROWLEY, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Lindsey Graham, absolutely.
I think if you had to look in your crystal ball, from what we have heard today, you probably are going to get a couple Republican votes out of this, probably Lindsey Graham, probably Orrin Hatch. You're going to get some tough questions. But I think Graham summed it up, saying, unless there's a meltdown, you are going to get confirmed.
So, you are going to hear this nice, but tough look at what kind of judgments she's made and what they say about her judicial philosophy. She is going to have to repeat that phrase about 1,000 times between now and the end of these hearings. But I think we know what the end is. We will see what we're going to do in the middle.
BLITZER: Jeff, Jessica Yellin is inside the Senate Hart Office Building, where this Judiciary Committee hearing has been going on.
And we have got a picture there, you see, of the back heads of Patrick Leahy on the right, Chuck Schumer right there in the sort of -- well, he's a little off screen right now. But he got very emotional, Chuck Schumer, Jessica Yellin. You could see his -- when he was introducing her, his lips were trembling a little bit. He got choked up. He got very emotional referring to her background.
JESSICA YELLIN, CNN CONGRESSIONAL CORRESPONDENT: He said that he is personally very invested in Sotomayor and her success here.
And he emphasized, Wolf, what we heard so many of the Democrats say. Their message is, she has more judicial experience than anyone else nominated to the bench in the last 100 years. That's the message they will drive home.
I thought what was interesting is, we did not hear from Sotomayor the words empathy or the word race or gender. She is going to steer clear of that as much as possible, although that won't be feasible for the rest of when she starts taking questions.
But she's trying to stay on the message of her enormous experience. As another note, Wolf, I would like to point out something that you guys probably could not see from your vantage. But once Al Franken, the newest senator on this panel, started talking, there was something in this room that we rarely hear -- see -- I'm sorry -- which is, every single senator on that panel was listening to him with rapt attention.
Usually, senators do not listen to each other. They're not even in the room for this. They all clearly wanted to hear what the newest member had to say, Al Franken. It was quite a scene.
BLITZER: He was very, very serious. No jokes from Al Franken, at least on this day.
YELLIN: Right.
BLITZER: Maybe down the road, we will get a few laughs from time to time.
There were three interruptions, brief interruptions, hecklers being evicted, during the course of these hours of this hearing, but that was that.
Just a little housekeeping. Tomorrow morning, we will be here for our special coverage. It will begin at 9:30 a.m. Eastern. That's when the questioning of Sonia Sotomayor by Democrats and Republicans will begin.
That will be an important day tomorrow. We will learn a whole lot more.
I will be back in less than an hour here in THE SITUATION ROOM.
But, right now, our coverage continues with Rick Sanchez and CNN NEWSROOM.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
RICK SANCHEZ, CNN ANCHOR (voice-over): Dick Cheney told the CIA, don't tell Congress?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The CIA is in the secrecy business.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This is a question of whether the former vice president of the United States denied certain sensitive information to the intelligence leaders in Congress.
SANCHEZ: But, if it happened, it's against the law, and Cheney could be called on it. We are on that.
Republicans turn up the heat on the -- quote -- "wise Latina woman."
SEN. LINDSEY GRAHAM (R), SOUTH CAROLINA: If I had said anything remotely like that, my career would have been over.
SANCHEZ: What does she say about that? You will hear it.
SANCHEZ: Kim Jong Il, does he have pancreatic cancer? And, if so, how long would he live?
Your national conversation for Monday, July 13, begins right now.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
SANCHEZ: It seemed like they were magic words that we just heard, fidelity to the law, as I wrote them down. The job of a judge is not to make law.
Hello again, everybody. I'm Rick Sanchez with the next generation of news. This is a conversation. It's not a speech. And it is your turn, as usual, to get involved.
There we go. Sonia Sotomayor just answered her critics, or did she, who insist that she's bound and determined to make law from the bench, that she would let personal biases get in her way somehow. You heard it right here, her retort, her retort to her opponents that now scrutinize what she says and prepare to grill her tomorrow. That's the way the system works. She says the law comes first.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JUDGE SONIA SOTOMAYOR, SUPREME COURT NOMINEE: In the past month, many senators have asked me about my judicial philosophy. Simple. Fidelity to the law. The task of a judge is not to make law. It is to apply the law.
And it is clear, I believe, that my record in two courts reflects my rigorous commitment to interpreting the Constitution, according to its terms, interpreting statutes according to their terms and Congress' intent, and hewing faithfully to precedents established by the Supreme Court and by my circuit court.
In each case I have heard, I have applied the law to the facts at hand.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SANCHEZ: Key words again, apply the law to the facts at hand. That is what she says.
Her opponents, Republicans, are suggesting that her judgment may be clouded by a bias toward minorities at times. And there's an irony that we probably should point out here as well. The Republican leading the charge is Alabama's Jeff Sessions. Years ago, Sessions was chosen for a federal judgeship and had his nomination quashed by this committee amid criticism that he was "grossly insensitive" -- stop quote -- to minorities.
Now, and ironically, it is Sessions insisting that Sotomayor demonstrate that she's impartial.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. JEFF SESSIONS (R), ALABAMA: I will not vote for and no senator should vote for an individual nominated by any president who is not fully committed to fairness and impartiality toward every person who appears before them.
I will not vote for and no senator should vote for an individual nominated by any president who believes it is acceptable for a judge to allow their personal background, gender prejudices or sympathies to sway their decision in favor of or against parties before the court.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SANCHEZ: So, it's an interesting process. And so much of it has to do with perspective.
As we follow along, Sessions, the ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, strongly suggesting that his mind is made up and he will vote against Sotomayor. But his comments were measured compared to those of Arizona's Jon Kyl. I want you to listen to Mr. Kyl. Here we go.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. JON KYL (R-AZ), MINORITY WHIP: I would hope that every American is proud that a Hispanic woman has been nominated to sit on the Supreme Court. In fulfilling our advice and consent rule, of course, we must evaluate Judge Sotomayor's fitness to serve on the merits, not on the basis of her ethnicity. With a background that creates a prima facie case for confirmation, the primary question I believe Judge Sotomayor must address in this hearing is her understanding of the role of an appellate judge. From what she has said, she appears to believe that role is not constrained to objectively decide who wins based on the weight of the law, but rather, who, in her personal opinion, should win.
The factors that will influence her decisions apparently include her gender and Latina heritage and foreign legal concepts that, as she said, get her creative juices going.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SANCHEZ: So there's the conflict. There's something else I need to point out for you as I take you through this journey of all these important comments raised by all these ladies and gentlemen today. Senate Republicans are raising concerns again about judicial activism.
Well, here is how Rhode Island Democrat Sheldon Whitehouse responded to that charge for Sonia Sotomayor.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. SHELDON WHITEHOUSE (D), RHODE ISLAND: these calls for restraint and modesty and complaints about activist judges are often code words, seeking a particular kind of judge who will deliver a particular set of political outcomes.
For all the talk of modesty and restraint, the right-wing justices of the court has a striking record of ignoring precedent, overturning congressional statutes, limiting constitutional protections, and discovering new constitutional rights.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SANCHEZ: All right, as you might imagine, we have lined up for you a bevy of legal and political experts who are going to join us to give us their perspective on everything that took place today, including that climactic moment there, where we actually heard Sonia Sotomayor respond.
It wasn't a lengthy response, but it was a response, nonetheless.
I want to begin now with one of the members of this committee.
Senator John Cornyn, Republican from Texas, is good enough to join us.
You know, when I -- Senator, thanks for being with us, sir.
SEN. JOHN CORNYN (R), TEXAS: You bet. Good to be with you.
SANCHEZ: When I was listening to you earlier, it seemed like what you were saying was -- and I remember -- I took some notes -- it seemed like what you were saying was that you didn't necessarily like what she had said or what you had heard that she had said, but you were willing to give her a hearing, to have her somehow convince you otherwise.
What are you going to be looking for to have her convince you otherwise?
CORNYN: Well, I think that's only fair, to give her the hearing. That's -- otherwise, we wouldn't need to be here for this week.
But, yes, I think, unfortunately, these hearings have not always been characterized by what I would call fairness. We mentioned Miguel Estrada's nomination just a few years ago, filibustered seven times, and then denied an up-or-down vote.
I assured Judge Sotomayor that would not happen to her, and she would get the respect that she and every nominee deserves. But she's made some pretty provocative statements, as we know, her comment about a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experience making better decisions than someone of a different sex or ethnicity.
And those sorts of things begin to cause questions, along with other things she has said, about whether she believes that -- in equal justice, or whether the outcome's going to depend on who the judge is. And that's what we're trying to get at.
SANCHEZ: You know, what's interesting is, though, it seems like in the old days people didn't follow judges around with microphones. And you, obviously, oftentimes maybe didn't even know what they said.
Today, we live in a society where everything is recorded, everything is jotted down. So what we have are some comments that she has made, which you are taking into account. And it's certainly your right to, Senator. But when you compare that to the rest of her judicial record, how do you put the two together?
And what are you at this point -- and you don't have to give us the invasion plans at this point and tell us how you're going to vote -- but does it make you perhaps lean the other way?
CORNYN: Well, it's hard to reconcile.
I think she's got an 18-year record as a judge that does not appear to be all that radical. But her speeches certainly are provocative is the best word I can think of. But she also questions this issue of whether judges can -- whether the law is truly neutral or whether judges can be objective.
And you will hear our colleagues on the other side, Senator Whitehouse and others, questioning whether all there is, is sort of a relativistic view of the world, and it's all just a difference in perspective.
Well, I think the concept of the rule of law depends on the law being the same and applied to each person in similar situations by judges, and not have variable outcomes, depending on that perspective that they may bring because of their ethnicity or their sex or their race or, you know, but only on the law. That's really I think what we're -- we're -- we're talking about. SANCHEZ: Well, it's interesting you mentioned Senator Whitehouse.
He seems to be saying -- and I want to get your take on this -- he seems to be saying that you and other Republicans are asking for, if not preaching, this now, but that in the past you haven't necessarily held that ground. And he even went on to say, quoting one of our own, Jeff Toobin, that this court, under Supreme Court Justice John Roberts, has not ruled the way you guys are asking them to rule.
Fair criticism or what?
CORNYN: I think it's a nice narrative he's selling, but I'm not buying.
I think, sure, politicians look at outcomes. Judges are supposed to look at the facts and work their way through a reasoned legal analysis, and the outcome is a product of that analysis. You don't start with the outcome first and work your way back.
So, I disagree with Senator Whitehouse and others that have complained that the Roberts court -- and I wonder why we're spending so much time attacking John Roberts and the Roberts court. I thought this was supposed to be about Judge Sotomayor.
SANCHEZ: All right, speaking of Judge Sotomayor, let me wrap things up with that. And I want to get from you now, did you get a -- obviously, you got a chance to listen to what she said there.
CORNYN: Sure.
SANCHEZ: It wasn't a long comment, but she did, right away, she hit it and she hit it hard. She said fidelity to the law, loyalty to the law , and then she went on to say, my task as a judge is not to make the law.
Sounds like she, Senator, is singing your tune. Is that enough?
(LAUGHTER)
CORNYN: Well, she said all the right things in her statement.
What I would like to do is have her reconcile what she said in her opening statement with the speeches that I alluded to earlier.
SANCHEZ: Yes.
CORNYN: That's where I'm going to inquire during my...
(CROSSTALK)
SANCHEZ: Well, what about the Ricci -- what about the Ricci case? Is that going to be something you are going to be hammering away at as well?
CORNYN: Well, it is. I worry that the way she and her fellow judges sort of seemed to sweep that case by the firefighters under the rug. It took another judge, Judge Cabranes, to call them out of it. And, then, ultimately, because of his dissent, it was agreed that -- the Supreme Court agreed to hear the case, and then reversed Judge Sotomayor.
We are going to have a couple witnesses here, firefighters, who basically were denied a promotion because of the color of their skin as a result of Judge Sotomayor's decision, both a Hispanic and an Anglo. So, it ought to be interesting. They will be here on Wednesday.
SANCHEZ: My old football coach in college and in high school always used to say, Sanchez, I appreciate the hustle.
I am going to kudo that to you. I appreciate you getting to the microphone so fast. It seems like this thing just ended, and you were able to come up and talk to us.
CORNYN: Thank you.
SANCHEZ: Senator John Cornyn from the great state of Texas, we thank you, sir.
CORNYN: Thank you.
SANCHEZ: All right.
Up next: Did Dick Cheney tell the CIA not to inform Congress of something, something somewhat mysterious to this day? We are drilling down with our own Candy Crowley and David Gergen on this.
Also, we're trying something new today. Stick around. When the TV version of this national conversation is over, I am going to try something new today. Log on to CNN.com/live, where the conversation will continue. That's right. We are going to continue the show for at least another 15 minutes today at 4:00 p.m. Eastern -- your tweets, your messages, your comments, our guests held over. It's the after- show.
We will be back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SANCHEZ: Getting a lot of comments here, as you might expect. Going to be following some of those, both on Sotomayor and that story we suggested moments ago about former Vice President Dick Cheney.
Let me catch you up. If you worked at the CIA and Vice President Dick Cheney came up and told you not to tell Congress what you know, even if that's against the law, would you do what he told you to do? Now, who is saying that the former vice president may have done just that, asking the CIA not to say things to Congress?
"The New York Times" citing two unidentified sources says the current CIA director, the current CIA director, Leon Panetta, is making that accusation about former Vice President Dick Cheney and some secret program that he had initiated.
Notice the way I word that, some secret program that he had initiated. So, what happens now? Well, there's two reactions that we can share with you at this point, anyway.
The party in power, the party in power, the Democrats, say there should be an investigation about this. The party that was in power when Dick Cheney was the vice president says, why look back?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
SEN. PATRICK LEAHY (D-VT), JUDICIARY COMMITTEE CHAIRMAN: If, as "The New York Times" says, we have the vice president of the United States telling people to break the law, now, that's a pretty serious matter. Either he did or he didn't. If he did, that's something we ought to know.
SEN. JOHN MCCAIN (R), ARIZONA: We all know that bad things were done. We all know that the operatives who did it most likely were under orders to do so. For us to continue this and harm our image throughout the world, I agree with the president of the United States. It's time to move forward and not go back.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SANCHEZ: You don't know at this point how much leverage this story's going to get in the coming days, perhaps weeks.
But let's join two people now who certainly would follow a story of this magnitude. Candy Crowley is with us once again, and David Gergen is good enough to join us.
My thanks to both of you for being with us.
CROWLEY: Sure.
SANCHEZ: You know, it's ironic and interesting that it seems to be, Candy, that this could very well be a continuation of a story that began not too long ago when House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told our own CNN's Dana Bash that the CIA had misinformed her, and look where we are now.
CROWLEY: Well, and that's why Republicans, actually, they say they're very suspicious of this timing, of the leak, that they think in fact it was put out there in order to -- because they believe obviously someone that was briefed by Leon Panetta put this out there.
I think we know so little at this point about where this story is going. I think that when you put it in combination with some other things that are percolating over at the Justice Department about whether to call in a criminal prosecutor to look at whether the U.S. tortured outside the parameters of the Bush administration, that this is building up to an extent that the Obama administration, which really doesn't want any of this to happen, is going to have to go with it. And I think probably the unhappiest, despite what Senator McCain says, that one of the unhappier people in this town about all this coming up, because there's four different things going on, is probably President Obama.
SANCHEZ: Yes.
Let's talk about just one of those things.
David Gergen, if I can bring you into the conversation, the question of a lot of folks who are watching right now who maybe don't necessarily study the Constitution or the law so closely are going to say, so what? The vice president of the United States decided that he wanted to keep a secret from some folks in Congress.
Why is CNN and why is David Gergen even talking about that? Let me show you a quote. This is one of the interpretations of this law, if not the law itself. Lawmakers on Intelligence Committees "are to be kept fully and currently informed of the intelligence activities of the United States, including any significant anticipated intelligence activity."
I think that dates back to the 1940s or '50s. It was a law passed.
It sounds like, just judging by that right there, that could be potential trouble for the former vice president, right?
DAVID GERGEN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: Boy, Rick, this is a complex area, as you well know.
The law was passed back in 1947. There have been a number of amendments to this National Security Act of 1947. There are some loopholes in that act. And what this seems to rotate around -- and I think Candy is right. We don't know all the facts, nor do we know exactly where this is going, but it is starting to mushroom and taking on a life of its own.
And I think we are heading toward some sort of investigation by the Democrats. We will have to see what it is. But, going back to the law, the -- the law says, look, it tells the CIA, tells the executive branch, you have got to keep Congress informed of significant intelligence activities.
Now, what we're hearing from the Republican side or people close to the Bush administration through "The Wall Street Journal" today, for example, is that there were conversations after 9/11 about setting up some sort of program to capture or kill al Qaeda operatives, and that this would have -- and this would have been a major new initiative had it been undertaken.
It was in the talking stage, according to these sources within the Bush administration or close to. It never got to sort of the operative stage, and, therefore, they weren't under an obligation to tell the Congress.
Now, you know, there's a gray line here. And a lot of Democrats think that -- and some Republicans think, like Peter Hoekstra on the Intelligence Committee, think that the Bush administration did a lousy job of keeping the Congress informed. But the Cheney people will tell you, well, wait a minute, we didn't get that far down the track, so there's nothing illegal here.
SANCHEZ: By the way, we should probably mention that caveat before we get too much grief from some folks who are going to say, well, you only gave part of the law.
You're right, David Gergen, as you usually are. There's a part of the law that also says this. Put that up if you can, Dan. I don't know if you have got that caveat. But it says, "The briefings should be done to the extent consistent with the due regard for the protection from unauthorized disclosure of clarified and from classified information relating to sensitive intelligence sources and methods or other exceptionally sensitive matters."
In other words, if the person who's got the secret really feels that if he tells anybody, it might get out, then maybe he can just not tell anybody. It's like we have a law, but here's an exception to the law...
GERGEN: Right.
SANCHEZ: ... which gets us back to what the vice president was or wasn't doing. I'm confused. I'm sure everyone else is confused.
Candy Crowley, do we know what this program was or as David alluded to moments ago whether it even ever got off the ground?
CROWLEY: It doesn't -- at least from the reporting from "The New York Times" and others, it doesn't look as though it ever fully got off the ground, that it was still in the planning stages, that it had to do with counterterrorism, surprise, surprise, and that it was about killing or capturing al Qaeda members more personally than dropping or than sending off air missiles.
Now, it doesn't strike me on the face of that, that surprising, that the CIA was going after al Qaeda members sort of, you know, on the ground.
But there's just, again, something about this we don't know. We don't know the details of what, you know, when you say killing them, what does that entail? You know, was it just, OK, shoot them the minute you see them, should you attempt to capture them, that kind of thing. So I don't think we know yet the specifics of that program.
DAVID GERGEN, FORMER POLITICAL ADVISER: Rick, you got to remember, we're in a new age here, too. You can now wake up somewhere in Fairfax County and drive to work at Langley and push a button and have a predator go in and hit an Al Qaeda, you know, camp.
We have seen that, we reported on it. After all, Bill Clinton was accused of not being tough enough in going after Usama bin Laden. He didn't get there with predators early enough, hit them early enough. RICK SANCHEZ, CNN ANCHOR: But I have to ask you, it behooves me too since you were part of the Reagan administration. The Reagan administration as most Americans know, was accused of, well --
GERGEN: All sorts of things.
(LAUGHTER)
SANCHEZ: -- not sharing with Congress what was going on with Iran Contra. In fact, that was one of the main sticking points.
How much trouble can an administration, either presently or former, get into by making it appear that they're not giving Congress or the American people enough information about what they're doing, by being secretive? It seems to be the theme we keep going back to with Bush and Cheney administration.
GERGEN: Listen, we have been here on this issue since time immemorial. Since all of us, before we were born, the Congress and executive branch were fighting over this issue.
On Iran Contra, Iran Contra underscores the fact this can be perilous for a president. In that case, what the Reagan administration found itself mired in was a situation where they had told the Congress one thing but were actually doing something very different in foreign policy. In effect, they were lying to the Congress.
And the president paid a huge price because of his underlings going around doing this kind of thing. And they were talking impeachment over that at one point, as you remember.
SANCHEZ: Yes.
GERGEN: So this can get very serious.
I think to go to Candy's point, the reason this is becoming more serious now is this whole history of what happened in Iraq, a lot of the country wants to know more about it. The Democrats want to know more about it.
But President Barack Obama himself really wants to move forward. He does not want to get mired in the past. He's got too much else on his plate. And so in some ways, there's a conflict here between the White House and the gathering momentum on Capitol Hill for serious investigations.
SANCHEZ: Irony of ironies. You make a good point. My thanks to both of you. Interesting conversation. My appreciation.
GERGEN: Thank you.
SANCHEZ: When the TV version of our national conversation is over, I want you to log on to CNN.com/live. We will do something a little different today. Our conversation's going to continue online. That's right. At 4:00 eastern, your tweets, your messages on Facebook, on MySpace, and we'll be holding back some of the guests as well. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SANCHEZ: Jeffrey Toobin got a mention during those hearings. I don't know if you noticed. We will have that for you in a little bit. In fact, Jeffrey Toobin our legal analyst will be joining me here in just a little bit to take us through the Sotomayor hearings.
But first, I want to get some of your reactions on the record as well, because so many of you, after watching what happened today and now listening to that story we just did moments ago about former Vice President Dick Cheney, have sent us your comments. Let's share some of those.
Go to the twitter board, if we possibly can. Art Cabrera is saying "Aren't we supposed to go after the leaders, the Al Qaeda leaders? I'm glad Cheney had a plan. Why did L.P. and Obama stop him?"
Cheney's actions are a matter of interpretation of the law. Was the omission vital to national security or not? My good friend and loyal viewer, mike, says "Obama gets hit in the polls and the subject once more reverts to Dick Cheney. Obama's lackeys are nauseatingly predictable." "Nauseatingly" -- fun word to say.
B.B. Spruce, I should say, says "Sometimes stuff that is top secret needs to be kept secret. Sometimes it's not good for Congress to know everything."
And finally, "I doubt anyone is really surprised that Cheney is behind CIA stuff, but Dems need to get some spine and prosecute him." There you go.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Judge Sotomayor, we will inquire as to how your philosophy which allows subjectivity in the courtroom, affects your decision making.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
SANCHEZ: Well, there you go. Republicans today going after her, but many of them saying I'm going to hear you out. Supreme Court nominee Sotomayor grilled during her confirmation hearings. We will examine with CNN legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin, who calls today the super bowl, the super bowl for legal geeks. We'll be right back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
SANCHEZ: Let me ask you a question. What other network's senior legal analyst has their name dropped at the Sotomayor hearings? None but ours, Jeff Toobin, joining us now from Washington.
Jeffrey, good to see you. I'm bragging on you, man.
JEFFREY TOOBIN, SENATOR LEGAL ANALYST, CNN: That Sheldon Whitehouse, aptly named. I think he's got a future, that guy.
(LAUGHTER)
SANCHEZ: Brilliant guy, right? I say that about the folks that say nice things about me, too.
TOOBIN: Absolutely.
SANCHEZ: Listen, I know you watched this thing all day. I'm interested in your take, I don't know, did you see my interview with senator from Durbin just a little -- oh, no. Senator from Texas --
TOOBIN: Kyl? No, Cornyn. Cornyn.
SANCHEZ: It was Cornyn. I get them all -- I asked Cornyn, there's two things to consider here, what she has said from time to time and her record. And he seemed to be saying that he's just about giving as much import to what she said as he is her record. That was interesting, wasn't it?
TOOBIN: Well, it is interesting, because there's a lot more for Republicans to work with with her speeches, with her off the bench comments, which have been far more controversial than her rulings, which have been very mainstream, very extensive. She has a huge record after 17 years as a federal judge.
But the comments are a little more provocative, and that gives the Republicans more to work with.
SANCHEZ: What's the biggest problem for her? Is it the Ricci case or the quote, quote, "Wise Latina woman," stop quote?
TOOBIN: I think it's a combination.
Basically, it's the Ricci case, the firefighters case where she was overturned, it's the wise Latina comment where she suggested it was somehow better to be a Latina than a white male, and it's the membership on the board of directors of the Puerto Rican Legal Defense Fund, all of which the Republicans, some Republicans will use to paint a picture of her as kind of an activist, someone who is more interested in helping her community than in interpreting the law.
That's a very tough sell, but I think that's the argument that they're building towards.
SANCHEZ: But you know what's interesting, my take, at least, on when she finally got a chance to speak, what she says is "I love my father, I love my mother, I love my family, I come from a great place, isn't it great to live in America, and by the way, fidelity to the law." Is that pretty much what we're going to be hearing from her?
TOOBIN: She knows what the rap is against her. So, in a subtle way, her opening statement was an anticipatory response to those criticisms. Equal justice under the law, no favoritism towards anybody, that's what the law means. That's the code she was speaking to respond to the criticism.
SANCHEZ: Do you think, you know, as we move forward here that she will be able to move any of her critics, Republican critics, who are saying it looks to me like in fact, you're there trying to make law?
TOOBIN: I think there are two Republicans on the Judiciary Committee, two of the seven, who really might vote for her, Orrin Hatch and Lindsey Graham. You really heard between the lines that they might.
I don't think the other five she has much of a shot at. But I think she does with those seven.
Can I add one thing, Rick?
SANCHEZ: Yes, go ahead.
TOOBIN: Something that really struck me about today's hearing, which was something you didn't hear -- same sex marriage. You did not hear the Republicans threatening, you know, if she's confirmed, we're going to have same sex marriage. I think the politics --
SANCHEZ: Is that because Karl Rove isn't in the White House anymore?
TOOBIN: Well, I think Republicans are recognizing that scare tactics that might have worked in 2004 do not necessarily work in 2009. The subject of same-sex marriage has gotten so much more mainstream --
SANCHEZ: You think?
TOOBIN: -- so quickly. I do.
SANCHEZ: You don't think -- it was certainly a wedge issue that, some would argue, that it helped get President Bush elected for a second term.
TOOBIN: Absolutely. That's what I said, 2004. I think it was a big issue in 2004. But that's five years ago. And I think the politics of that issue are changing fast. And I thought the fact that the Republicans didn't raise it was interesting.
SANCHEZ: You know what else is interesting? As I watch this thing, I think to -- I would, and I mentioned this I think when I was talking to Senator Cornyn, got his name right this time, that I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall 100 years ago when they were going through these decisions and having these hearings, because it seems like there's a lot of political correctness going on today.
And I agree with Lindsey Graham. I don't think a lot of folks in that hearing room are actually saying what they think. They are saying what they think they need to be heard thinking.
TOOBIN: I think there's a lot to that, Rick, because each president who proposes a nominee says well, all he or she is going to do is enforce the law. That's it. Just apply the law.
Well, the fact is, when you're dealing with questions like, does the constitution protect a woman's right to abortion, may the University of Michigan consider race when deciding whom to admit, those are questions that do not have obvious answers under the law. The law is ambiguous, and it takes politics, it takes ideology to decide those questions. And nobody really wants to acknowledge that. They say I'll just apply the law. The law is not clear. And that's what --
SANCHEZ: But you're an expert. And if you said what you just said in that hearing room, they would throw your butt out.
TOOBIN: Well, they had any number of reasons to do that.
SANCHEZ: No, I mean, if she -- what I'm trying to say, and I'm being funny about it, if she had said that, they would say, forget about it, you know, case dismissed, you're out of here, right?
TOOBIN: That's part of the code that governs the Supreme Court, is that you're supposed to pretend that these legal issues are completely divorced from politics, when it's my belief that you can't decide these questions, however you come out, pro life, pro choice, without bringing your politics to bear on them.
SANCHEZ: Sometimes reality and perception are two different things. Jeffrey Toobin, as usual -- hey, congratulations on that shout-out today by the way.
TOOBIN: Thanks, Rick, see you.
SANCHEZ: All right, take a look at the North Korean leader, Kim Jong- il. There have been some reports of his declining health. Now South Korean media say it's worse than what we thought. They say he has pancreatic cancer.
Also, we will be trying something new today. We want you to stick around for it if you can. It's the new TV version of our national conversation. It's going to be on CNN.com/live. So you can go there and catch us as we end things in a different way on CNN.com. Your tweets, messages included, of course.
We'll be right back.
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SANCHEZ: Kim Jong-il of North Korea may have one of the deadliest forms of cancer imaginable. There are conflicting reports on this, but that is what South Korea's state-run news agency is reporting.
Here are the most recent photos that have many people wondering what's up with the quote, "Dear Leader." He looks gaunt, less hair and even with a slight limp. The story today from South Korea is that he has pancreatic, pancreatic cancer.
CNN is checking but has not been able to independently confirm that report. It is important to note, though, that if true, it would be particularly newsworthy given that only 5 percent of people who contract this disease actually survive it.
The president nominates a family practice doctor from Alabama to be the nation's surgeon general. Who was it and what did she have to say?
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SANCHEZ: A small-town doctor from an Alabama bayou famous for making house calls is the president's pick to be the next United States Surgeon General.
And there she is, Dr. Regina Benjamin, 52-years-old, a woman President Obama called "A relentless promoter of programs to fight preventable illness." Dr. Benjamin says, quote, "I can be a voice to improve our nation's health for the future."
Next step for her, anyway, is the Senate confirmation.
Trying to do something new today, speaking of confirmations. We're going to be covering the story of Sotomayor and obviously the Dick Cheney revelations right here after the show.
Stick around when the TV version of our national conversation ends, logon to CNN.com/live where the conversation continues online, 4:00 eastern, your tweets, your message, Facebook, MySpace, all of it for an extra 15.
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SANCHEZ: Welcome back. I'm Rick Sanchez here in the world headquarters of CNN, following some of the major stories that many Americans are keeping up with today.
There's only one word on Capitol Hill today, and most people, by the way, are mispronouncing it. It's Sotomayor. Sotomayor. Not Sotameyer, Sotamiyere. Judge Sonia Sotomayor, the president's pick for Supreme Court Justice.
And despite some strong language from the Judiciary Committee senators, her confirmation look, -- well, repeat, looks, at this point, anyway, like a shoe-in.
All right, I'm about to find out if another Sanchez agrees with me on this one. Leslie Sanchez is good enough to join us now. Also here is Maria Cardona, she's a Democratic strategist. You know Leslie is a Republican strategist, Maria is a Democratic strategist, and that's why we bring them together.
LESLIE SANCHEZ, REPUBLICAN STRATEGIST: Leslie, my namesake, let me begin with you. Sanchez. Sanchez.
SANCHEZ: Oh, it's Sanchez. Sorry. Sotomayor
LESLIE SANCHEZ: I'm just kidding. I know, there you go.
SANCHEZ: Hey, how did she do? Did she hold up? Did you like what she had to say? What did you think?
LESLIE SANCHEZ: I thought she did incredibly well. You know, she did a very good job of threading that very delicate needle between answering her critics with respect to empathy. She says one line -- "My personal and professional experience helped me to listen and understand." She's particularly talking about that empathy that President Obama has talked about in selecting her.
But she also applied another word, the word "apply," which is something that Justice Roberts also said, you know, when she's talking about the task of a judge is not to make law but apply law. Justice Roberts also talked about an umpire, you know, applying the rules.
So, regardless of the politics, I think she did a very good job at introducing herself very briefly.
SANCHEZ: Did you think -- let me ask Maria this. Did you think -- at time when I was looking at her and she seemed to be annoyed at the fact that she was being lectured by some people who were telling her what her job as a judge is supposed to be vis-a-vis interpreting the law rather than making the law, et cetera, et cetera.
Did it seem that way to you, or was that just my take?
MARIA CARDONA, DEMOCRATIC STRATEGIST: No. Actually, what it seemed like to me, and I heard several people repeated this, is that she had an incredible poker face on, and that nobody would want to go up against her in playing poker.
SANCHEZ: A what face? A poker face. OK.
LESLIE SANCHEZ: Yes. A poker face.
SANCHEZ: Like not giving anything away.
LESLIE SANCHEZ: Exactly.
And that's, again, you know, as it should be. I think that she was taking everything in. I think she did a fabulous job of -- in her remarks, of addressing some of the key criticisms and the key concerns that she knows very well because, again, let's remember that she has met with more senators than any other Supreme Court nominee in the past.
She knows very well what the criticism of her ism, and she wants to face that head on and I think she did that well today by underscoring fidelity to the law, which is something that she's been saying for a very long time.
SANCHEZ: Did you think, Leslie, that the Republican senators were able to balance their criticism of some of the comments that she had made in the past with their openness and ability to give her a fair hearing?
LESLIE SANCHEZ: Absolutely. If anything, I think the Republican senators should be commended. They did a very good job of being respectful, to be clear. But they also articulated what their concerns were. And I think, to go back to Jeffrey Toobin, more shout outs to him, he's exactly right in defining -- there's a distinct difference between the cases and some of her decisions, as well as the kind of the toxic nature of her speeches and her off-the-cuff statements.
That's where we're going to see the clash beginning tomorrow, deciphering the two.
SANCHEZ: Is that really fair? You know, if somebody follows the three of us around, especially being that we're Hispanic, when we decide --
LESLIE SANCHEZ: I could say something but I'm --
SANCHEZ: No, but seriously. And by the way, it's Irish guys and Italian women and everybody else. There's a bunch of us like this.
When we're in a group of people, and they ask us a question, and we decide that we're going to be candid or jocular or jovial, we may say things that we don't necessarily say when we are in our chosen profession or when we're doing a dissertation.
Is it fair to judge people on those things -- of course, unless they say something totally ridiculous?
LESLIE SANCHEZ: I think -- if I can answer, I think some of these statements were totally ridiculous. I think the important term that Senator Graham viewed was "unnerving" to some of these Republicans who would vote against her based on these unnerving statements, these speeches she's made.
She's going to have to clarify that. And remember --
SANCHEZ: Especially that -- yes, I think the wise Latina woman deserves to be --
LESLIE SANCHEZ: Well, that --
SANCHEZ: Guys, hold on. Let me tell the audience. The three of us are going to stay here. We're going to CNN.com/live, where we're going to continue this conversation and bring you into it. Here now, though, Wolf Blitzer in "The Situation Room" -- Wolf?
