Resurfaced footage from late last year shows Sen. John Kennedy sounding off on Mustafa Taher Kasubhai, nominee to be United States District Judge for the District of Oregon. Kennedy criticized the nominee for requesting litigants to state their pronouns.
While the Louisiana senator maintained that Americans are free to use whatever pronouns they like, he suggested that it is an abuse of power for Kasubhai to request litigants to state them in court. “If you want to use different pronouns, that is your business. I may not agree I may not do it, but that’s your business. This is America. And you’re free to do that,” he said.
Kennedy continued, “But this judge used his authority to require litigants in his courtroom to do what he thinks is politically correct. And he did that as a magistrate judge. And he’ll do it as a federal district judge and you note once again, I don’t care what his political beliefs are.”
The Republican congressman further disputed that the request to state one’s pronouns was voluntary. “But he has no right as a sitting judge, to direct in writing litigants in his courtroom to stand up and introduce themselves by saying ‘my name is John Kennedy, my preferred pronouns are.’ Now the judge said in his testimony that was voluntary. That’s not true,” he said. “I’ve read the order.”
Kennedy further substantiated his argument that such a request is not voluntary, stating, “I’m a litigant in his courtroom, paying a lawyer $400 an hour to try to get my case resolved. And the man on the bench who’s going to decide my case tells me to stand up and announce my pronouns. That’s not voluntary. That’s oppressive.”
The senator argued that, on these grounds alone, the Kasubhai should be disqualified. “And that alone, forget his writings, which Senator Cruz went through very eloquently. That alone tells me that he cannot exercise power majority. If I could vote no, twice, I would,” he said.
Kennedy also illustrated that his disapproval of the nominee is not the result of polarized, partisan gridlock, pointing out that he struck down the nominations of several Trump nominations. “And on this final point, when President Trump nominated people, they weren’t qualified to be on the federal bench. We killed those nominations. And several people on your side of the hour, my Democratic colleagues and on our side of the aisle did it. By my count, we killed five of them. Dead as fried chicken.” Watch Kennedy’s monologue below:
"*" indicates required fields
The GOP congressman concluded that Kasubhai was not qualified to be a federal judge. “This man is not qualified to exercise power. As a federal judge is bad enough that he’s a magistrate …. When somebody is qualified to be on the federal bench by god, I will stand up. I don’t care what party they are. I was the lone Democrat Republican vote to confirm a nominee from Tennessee … the lone Republican vote … but from now on, if we’re gonna play it like this, we’re going to have a debate on all of these nominees …”
Note: The featured image is a screenshot from the embedded video.