Sen. Mike Lee will vote against Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, SCOTUS nominee

WASHINGTON — Utah Sen. Mike Lee said he would vote no on Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson’s supreme court nomination. Jackson stood before the Senate Judiciary Committee in March to hear the stance of 22 senators on her nomination.

The Senate Judiciary Committee is expected to split down the middle on Jackson’s nomination, as no Republican members of the committee have expressed their desire to accept Jackson’s nomination.

Sen. Lee started with positive things to say about Jackson’s character and credentials before he spoke about her career as a judge. He then expressed concern about what he called her leniency toward sentencing child porn offenders.

Her history of light sentences in child porn cases drove his argument.

“These are commercialized efforts to profit off of child sex torture,” Lee said. “Enhancements for computer transmission and receipt for number of images for pre pubescent victims, and for sadomasochistic conduct carried out in those, very often dismissing or minimizing those enhancements simply because she disagrees with certain key policy elements, elements underlying them.” Lee said.

“This is troubling and we don’t even have the pre-sentence reports and the other documents we need to review them. I will vote no.”

Despite the expected tie in the Senate Judiciary Committee, Jackson is still on pace to be confirmed. Later this week, another vote will be held to break the tie. Jackson is expected to be confirmed at this vote considering she has the support of all Democratic senators and at least one Republican senator, Susan Collins of Maine.

Related: 

• NYT: Susan Collins will vote to confirm Ketanji Brown Jackson, becoming first GOP senator to back Biden’s Supreme Court pick

• Manchin says he will vote for Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson

• Defending her record, Jackson back for 3rd day of hearings