President Obama picks Solicitor General Kagan for Supreme Court

Solicitor General Elena Kagan is President Barack Obama’s pick to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens.

Obama called on the Senate to swiftly confirm Kagan, who he praised as “one of the nation’s foremost legal minds.”

White House officials quickly indicated they would move aggressively to win Kagan’s confirmation. Kagan will start making the rounds of “courtesy calls” in
the Senate this week, said Ron Klain, Vice President Joseph Biden’s chief of
staff.

{mosads}Kagan is Obama’s second Supreme Court nominee. Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor was nominated and confirmed last summer.

Obama lauded Kagan, the first female solicitor general and the first woman to serve as Dean of Harvard Law School, as a “trail-blazing leader.”

Kagan said she was “honored” and “humbled” by Obama’s nomination.

“The court is an extraordinary institution in the work it does and by the work it can do for the American people,” she said.

The president made his decision Sunday and informed Kagan, who was thought to be the leading candidate from the time Stevens announced his retirement.
 
Though she has never served as a judge, Kagan is seen as a consensus-builder whose confirmation would go down more smoothly with conservative lawmakers than some other potential high-court picks.

The Senate confirmed her to the solicitor general post last year, though 31 Republicans voted against her nomination.

The Senate confirmed Kagan on a solid 61-31 vote with GOP Sens. Tom Coburn (Okla.), Susan Collins (Maine), Judd Gregg (N.H.), Orrin Hatch (Utah), Jon Kyl (Ariz.), Richard Lugar (Ind.) and Olympia Snowe (Maine) casting votes in her favor.

Hatch said his vote in favor of confirming Kagan as solicitor general does not confirm her qualifications as a Supreme Court justice. He said he would look at her entire record to determine her judicial philosophy.

Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said Kagan would be treated fairly by Senate Republicans.

“The American people expect judges to apply the Constitution and laws of the United States fairly and impartially — as they are written, not how they could have been written but were not,” he said in a statement.

“Even though the president who nominates them has personal policy preferences, judges must not be a rubberstamp for any administration. Judges must not walk into court with a preconceived idea of who should win,” he said.

Klain said the administration would work to facilitate the release of Kagan’s papers from her time in the Clinton White House, where she served both as associate counsel and as deputy assistant to the president for domestic policy and deputy director of the domestic policy council.

White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said the White House is about two weeks ahead of the process from where it was last year with Sotomayor. Because of that head start, officials said they think the Senate has plenty of time to confirm Kagan before the court’s August term begins.



If confirmed, Kagan would likely have to recuse herself from as many as a dozen cases in the coming term and maybe five in the term after that because of work she has done as solicitor general, Klain said.



Kagan’s tenure as Harvard’s dean is sure to become fodder because of her decision to block military recruiters from the campus.


Klain argued Kagan had followed long-standing policy at the school and followed the rulings of the courts as the issue unfolded.

 More Harvard students joined the military during Kagan’s tenure than before, Klain said.



“That she is somehow anti-military is ridiculous and absurd,” Klain said.


The president had also considered and interviewed Dean Martha Minow, Judge Merrick Garland, Judge Diane Wood and Judge Sidney Thomas. Obama called them shortly after he spoke with Kagan.

“Before the decision was made, and for many hours throughout the weekend, the confirmation team worked off of rollout scenarios for multiple candidates,” the White House said.

The White House said Obama called Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), McConnell and Judiciary Committee Chairman Pat Leahy (D-Vt.) on Monday morning. He tried to reach committee ranking member Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) but was unsuccessful.

The president interviewed Kagan on April 30, and Vice President Joseph Biden had breakfast with Kagan on April 27.

The White House said Biden and his staff were intimately involved in the process. Obama and Biden discussed the pick over the weekly lunch last week and again by phone while Biden was in Europe.

This story was updated at 12:33 p.m.