Archive for May, 2009:
Stand with Sotomayor
From OFA Director Mitch Stewart:
This week, hundreds of thousands of supporters like you stood up to support Judge Sonia Sotomayor's historic nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court. But the long road to confirmation has only just begun. Add your voice, and stand with Sotomayor.
We've just launched our action center, an online hub where you can find all the tools you need to help spread the word about Judge Sotomayor, engage in the public debate about her nomination, and make sure decision-makers in the Senate know where you stand. With only a few minutes, you can make a huge difference.
Check out the action center and help confirm this great nominee.
In the coming days and weeks, our opponents will try to play politics with Judge Sotomayor's nomination, and it's up to us to help get out the facts and show the public -- and key decision-makers -- how much support she really has. Here's how you can help:
Stand with Sotomayor: You can add your name to our public display of support, showing the Senate and the media where the American people stand.
Write a letter to the editor: Using our easy online tool, you can send a letter to your local newspaper about why you support Judge Sotomayor's nomination -- highlighting her extraordinary life story, her tremendous judicial experience, the historic nature of her nomination, or anything else that's important to you. It's extremely effective and only takes a few minutes.
Call your Senator: You can look up the numbers of your two Senators, and give them a call to let them know that you support Judge Sotomayor and hope they do too.
Share President Obama's message: The president has recorded a special message explaining his support for Judge Sotomayor -- you can send it on to help educate friends and family.
Display your support: Download posters and get images you can use online to show your support.
Whichever actions you take you'll be playing a critical role in this historic moment.
Please visit the action center now.Thank you,
Mitch
Mitch Stewart
Director
Organizing for America
Stand with Sotomayor
From OFA Director Mitch Stewart:
This week, hundreds of thousands of supporters like you stood up to support Judge Sonia Sotomayor's historic nomination to the U.S. Supreme Court. But the long road to confirmation has only just begun. Add your voice, and stand with Sotomayor.
We've just launched our action center, an online hub where you can find all the tools you need to help spread the word about Judge Sotomayor, engage in the public debate about her nomination, and make sure decision-makers in the Senate know where you stand. With only a few minutes, you can make a huge difference.
Check out the action center and help confirm this great nominee.
In the coming days and weeks, our opponents will try to play politics with Judge Sotomayor's nomination, and it's up to us to help get out the facts and show the public -- and key decision-makers -- how much support she really has. Here's how you can help:
Stand with Sotomayor: You can add your name to our public display of support, showing the Senate and the media where the American people stand.
Write a letter to the editor: Using our easy online tool, you can send a letter to your local newspaper about why you support Judge Sotomayor's nomination -- highlighting her extraordinary life story, her tremendous judicial experience, the historic nature of her nomination, or anything else that's important to you. It's extremely effective and only takes a few minutes.
Call your Senator: You can look up the numbers of your two Senators, and give them a call to let them know that you support Judge Sotomayor and hope they do too.
Share President Obama's message: The president has recorded a special message explaining his support for Judge Sotomayor -- you can send it on to help educate friends and family.
Display your support: Download posters and get images you can use online to show your support.
Whichever actions you take you'll be playing a critical role in this historic moment.
Please visit the action center now.Thank you,
Mitch
Mitch Stewart
Director
Organizing for America
Open Thread
Photo: Celina Sotomayor, the mother of Appeals Court Judge Sonia Sotomayor, cries during the announcement by President Barack Obama that her daughter is the nominee to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice David Souter, in the East Room of the White House, May 26, 2009.
Message from Joe Biden: “A home run”
Yesterday, Vice President Joe Biden sent out a message to supporters about President Obama nominee for the Supreme Court, Judge Sonia Sotomayor:
President Obama hit a home run with his nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court -- and not just because she's the "woman who saved baseball" by ending the strike in 1995, nor simply because she would be the first Latina ever to serve on the high court.
It was a home run because in her three-decade career as a prosecutor, judge, private litigator and law professor, she has time and again earned bipartisan praise as one of America's finest legal minds. And it was the right choice because Judge Sotomayor -- herself born and raised in a South Bronx housing project -- has summed up the American dream in her own incredible story and never once forgotten how the law affects our daily lives.
Now her historic nomination goes to the Senate. I know that process well, and I can tell you that the debate of the coming weeks and months will be shaped by the public response in the next few hours and days. It's critical that the Senate and the public clearly see where the American people stand.
Will you add your name to the growing list of Americans who are pledging to "Stand with Sotomayor" today? Your name and comments will become part of a public display of support at this crucial time.
I've followed Judge Sotomayor's remarkable journey for years. I voted for her when President George H.W. Bush nominated her for the District Court in 1992, and I was proud to vote for her again when President Bill Clinton nominated her for the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in 1998.
Born to a Puerto Rican family, Sotomayor grew up in a public housing project in the South Bronx. She was an avid reader from an early age, and was first inspired to pursue a legal career by the Nancy Drew mystery novels. Driven by her mother's belief in the power of education and her own relentless work ethic, she excelled in school. She won a scholarship to Princeton University, graduated summa cum laude, and then went on to attend Yale Law School where she served as an editor of the prestigious Yale Law Journal.
Like President Obama, Sotomayor passed up many more lucrative opportunities after law school to put her degree to work for the public good. She served as an Assistant District Attorney in New York, tackling some of the hardest cases facing the city, including robberies, assaults, murders, police brutality, and child pornography. Her growing reputation for fearlessness and legal brilliance prompted her first nomination to the federal bench, and she's only continued to soar.
If confirmed, she would start with more federal judicial experience than any Justice in a century, more overall judicial experience than any Justice in 70 years, and replace David Souter as the only Justice with firsthand experience as a trial judge. She has participated in over 3,000 panel decisions and authored roughly 400 opinions, expertly handling difficult issues of constitutional law, complicated procedural matters, and lawsuits involving complex business organizations.
In her years on the bench, Judge Sotomayor has earned acclaim from legal scholars and experts from both sides of the aisle for her intellectual toughness, her probing oral questioning, and her ability to issue decisions that hold both factual details and legal doctrines in equal measure. And she's never failed to apply a steady, common-sense analysis of how the law touches our daily lives.
Her story is incredible. Her qualifications are undeniable. And her judgment will serve us all well on the highest court in the land.
Please join me in becoming a part of this historic moment for the Court and our country. Add your name now to publicly show that you, too, "Stand with Sotomayor." In these crucial early hours, let us leave no doubt about the people's support for this extraordinary nominee.
Thank you,
Vice President Joe Biden
President Obama on Call to Volunteers: “We need you to stay involved”
Aboard Air Force One earlier today, President Obama took time to speak by phone with thousands of Organizing for America volunteers about the urgent need to organize for health care reform.
“If we don’t get it done this year, we’re not going to get it done,” the President said.
He stressed that health care reform will only become a reality if grassroots supporters mobilize support for it in every community in America. The fight over health care reform, he noted, offers a "big chance to prove that the movement that started during the campaign isn’t over.”
We need you to stay involved. The election in November, that didn’t bring about change, that just gave us an opportunity for change...Some of you are in states and districts where politicians are resistant to bringing about change, so we need you to get involved.
If you missed the call, you can listen to the rest of what the President had to say here:
Also speaking on the call was David Plouffe, OFA Director Mitch Stewart, OFA Deputy Director Jeremy Bird, OFA New Media Director Natalie Foster and OFA volunteer Diane Robertson, who offered her advice on how to organize support in your community.
The fight over health care reform begins in your neighborhood June 6th. Sign up to host or attend a kickoff event in your area.
President Obama on Call to Volunteers: “We need you to stay involved”
Earlier today, President Obama took time to speak by phone with thousands of Organizing for America volunteers about the urgent need to organize for health care reform.
“If we don’t get it done this year, we’re not going to get it done,” the President said.
He stressed that health care reform will only become a reality if grassroots supporters mobilize support for it in every community in America. The fight over health care reform, he noted, offers a "big chance to prove that the movement that started during the campaign isn’t over.”
We need you to stay involved. The election in November, that didn’t bring about change, that just gave us an opportunity for change...Some of you are in states and districts where politicians are resistant to bringing about change, so we need you to get involved.
If you missed the call, you can listen to the rest of what the President had to say here:
Also speaking on the call was David Plouffe, OFA Director Mitch Stewart, OFA Deputy Director Jeremy Bird, OFA New Media Director Natalie Foster and OFA volunteer Diane Robertson, who offered her advice on how to organize support in your community.
The fight over health care reform begins in your neighborhood June 6th. Sign up to host or attend a kickoff event in your area.
Reactions to Sotomayor’s Nomination: “She is everything one would want in a first-rate judge”
Forty eight hours after the announcement, here are just a few of the initial reactions to President Obama's decision to nominate Judge Sotomayor to the Supreme Court:
Former Chief Judge of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals and Carter appointee Jon Newman said Sotomayor was “Everything one would want in a first-rate judge.” NPR reported that Judge Newman called Sotomayor a brilliant lawyer and a fair-minded pragmatist. “She is everything one would want in a first-rate judge,” he said. [NPR, 5/27/09]
Lawyer and Supreme Court expert Tom Goldstein praises Sotomayor as “extremely entelligent” with “overwhelming qualifications." On MSNBC, Goldstein said, “Objectively, her qualifications are overwhelming from the perspective of ordinary Americans. She has been a prosecutor, private litigator, trial judge, and appellate judge. No one currently on the Court has that complete package of experience… The objective evidence is that Sotomayor is in fact extremely intelligent. Graduating at the top of the class at Princeton is a signal accomplishment. Her opinions are thorough, well-reasoned, and clearly written. Nothing suggests she isn’t the match of the other Justices.” [SCOTUS Blog, 5/26/2009]
Sen. Olympia Snowe called Sotomayor “well-qualified” and said her selection was “historic.” "Indisputably, this is an historic selection, as Sonia Sotomayor is just the third woman to be nominated to The Court and the first Hispanic American. I commend President Obama for nominating a well-qualified woman, as I urged him to do during a one-on-one meeting on a variety of issues in the Oval Office earlier this month. I also appreciate that White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel called me personally this morning to inform me of the President's selection.” [Snowe Statement, 5/26/09]
Founding Dean of UC-Irvine Law School said Sotomayor “Is an excellent choice because she is an outstanding judge.” Erwin Chemerinsky wrote, “But most of all, Sotomayor is an excellent choice because she is an outstanding judge. Her opinions are clearly written and invariably well-reasoned. My former students who have clerked for her rave about her as a judge and as a person. She has enormous experience as a lawyer and as a judge, both in the federal district court and the federal court of appeals. The bottom line is that the court will now have its third woman justice in history, its first Latina, and an individual who likely will be an excellent justice for decades to come.” [The New Republic, 5/26/09]
Reactions to Sotomayor’s Nomination: “She is everything one would want in a first-rate judge”
Forty eight hours after the announcement, here are just a few of the initial reactions to President Obama's decision to nominate Judge Sotomayor to the Supreme Court:
Former Chief Judge of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals and Carter appointee Jon Newman said Sotomayor was “Everything one would want in a first-rate judge.” NPR reported that Judge Newman called Sotomayor a brilliant lawyer and a fair-minded pragmatist. “She is everything one would want in a first-rate judge,” he said. [NPR, 5/27/09]
Lawyer and Supreme Court expert Tom Goldstein praises Sotomayor as “extremely entelligent” with “overwhelming qualifications." On MSNBC, Goldstein said, “Objectively, her qualifications are overwhelming from the perspective of ordinary Americans. She has been a prosecutor, private litigator, trial judge, and appellate judge. No one currently on the Court has that complete package of experience… The objective evidence is that Sotomayor is in fact extremely intelligent. Graduating at the top of the class at Princeton is a signal accomplishment. Her opinions are thorough, well-reasoned, and clearly written. Nothing suggests she isn’t the match of the other Justices.” [SCOTUS Blog, 5/26/2009]
Sen. Olympia Snowe called Sotomayor “well-qualified” and said her selection was “historic.” "Indisputably, this is an historic selection, as Sonia Sotomayor is just the third woman to be nominated to The Court and the first Hispanic American. I commend President Obama for nominating a well-qualified woman, as I urged him to do during a one-on-one meeting on a variety of issues in the Oval Office earlier this month. I also appreciate that White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel called me personally this morning to inform me of the President's selection.” [Snowe Statement, 5/26/09]
Founding Dean of UC-Irvine Law School said Sotomayor “Is an excellent choice because she is an outstanding judge.” Erwin Chemerinsky wrote, “But most of all, Sotomayor is an excellent choice because she is an outstanding judge. Her opinions are clearly written and invariably well-reasoned. My former students who have clerked for her rave about her as a judge and as a person. She has enormous experience as a lawyer and as a judge, both in the federal district court and the federal court of appeals. The bottom line is that the court will now have its third woman justice in history, its first Latina, and an individual who likely will be an excellent justice for decades to come.” [The New Republic, 5/26/09]
Open Thread: Nevada
PHOTO: The President visits Nellis Air Force Base, in Las Vegas, Nevada May 27, 2009.