CNN "The Lead with Jake Tapper" - Transcript: Interview with Senator Sheldon Whitehouse

Interview

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TAPPER: All right, Manu Raju, thank you so much.

Joining us now to discuss Democratic Senator Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island. He's on the Senate Judiciary Committee, which, of course, is holding the confirmation hearing.

Senator, I want to get your reaction to Judge Barrett's opening statement and the arguments you heard from your colleagues today.

SEN. SHELDON WHITEHOUSE (D-RI): Well, we have heard these kind of standard confirmation hearing pabulum open statements before. They happen all the time. They say they're going to respect precedent. They say that judges shouldn't make policy.

And then they get onto the court, and they go off and overrule statutes that have been passed by Congress with huge bipartisan majorities, like the renewal of the Voting Rights Act, because they reached a determination that there was no danger to minority voters of being disenfranchised in the states that had a history of disenfranchising majority -- minority voters.

So, you know, they upend American politics by letting corporations spend unlimited amounts of money in politics. Those are not things where they're following the law. Those are things that they have made up, and they have done it 5-4, through partisan Republican majorities, and it always helps the big donors on the Republican side.

So -- but we have heard that before. So, we hear it again. It's perfectly understandable.

TAPPER: So I want to ask you about one specific part of Judge Barrett's remarks today. Take a listen.

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BARRETT: More than the style of his writing, though, it was the content of Justice Scalia's reasoning that shaped me. His judicial philosophy was straightforward. A judge must apply the law as it is written, not as she wishes it were.

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TAPPER: So, Judge Barrett seems to be suggesting that she will not let her personal views affect her judgment, she will just adhere to the law. It sounds like you don't believe her.

WHITEHOUSE: I don't.

I think that this is very scripted confirmation hearing stuff that we hear over and over and over again, and then judges go on the court, having said all this stuff, and they go out and behave completely differently.

And, frankly, her description of Judge Scalia is not even very accurate. Justice Scalia was in the Citizens United court and in the Shelby County court, I believe, and both of those were decisions that violated the principles that this nominee just said he stood for.

It just -- it just ain't so. It's confirmation theater, Jake.

TAPPER: Well, let's -- I mean, but let's get down to brass tacks here. I mean, you guys are focusing, Democrats are focusing on the Affordable Care Act.

But, by all indications, she's not likely to answer how she's going to rule on the case. And she has...

WHITEHOUSE: She's already answered how she is going to rule on the case.

She sent a loud enough signal to get this nomination. And the signal was that the swing vote in that case, Justice Roberts, was wrong, that she disagreed with it.

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TAPPER: You're talking about the book review she wrote when she expressed disagreement with Justice Roberts.

WHITEHOUSE: Correct.

TAPPER: So, I guess my point is, the Republicans are going to vote for her. And she has the votes. Republicans control the Senate.

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WHITEHOUSE: Correct.

TAPPER: So, is your goal, since you don't appear to be able to pick off any other Republican votes that I can tell, to make the case about that she's going to overturn Obamacare, the Affordable Care Act, and make it kind of like a rallying cry to vote against Trump?

Is that really the goal of the hearings here?

WHITEHOUSE: Well, if there's any way to turn this, it's because a Republican in the committee or two more Republicans on the floor choose to vote against her.

And there's immense pressure from big Republican political forces to cram her on the court. They have been desperate to own this court for a long time. So they're really going to have to have a good reason to push back.

And that reason is going to be the public, particularly for senators in close races, calling up and saying, hey, whoa, whoa, wait a minute, she's going to get rid of my health care, she's going to get rid of Roe vs. Wade and my ability to determine my own choices, and she's going to get rid of Obergefell.

Those are the three -- being the gay marriage case, that is -- those are the three things that are in the Republican Party platform.

TAPPER: Right.

WHITEHOUSE: Judges must reverse those decisions.

So, I think it's very fair for Democrats to point out that that's the plan. And we know that's the plan because the Republicans said so. TAPPER: Yes, I'm not saying it's not fair. I'm just wondering what the

strategy is, since it -- I mean, I don't see any more votes for you to pick up.

I guess, who has said they're going to vote against her in the Republican Party right now?

WHITEHOUSE: Well, the signals are from Senator Murkowski and Senator Collins.

TAPPER: Senator Collins, right, yes. But you need four.

WHITEHOUSE: Correct.

TAPPER: I mean, I don't see any...

WHITEHOUSE: So, we need two more.

TAPPER: I don't see anyone else. Do you?

WHITEHOUSE: Not at the moment.

That's why it's important to make this confirmation process salient to real Americans who have real skin in the game for health care, for instance, in the middle of a pandemic, for -- we have had a whole generation of women who've been brought up with Roe vs. Wade as a constitutional baseline, as a given.

The idea that this nominee might knock that out from underneath and reopen all those sore wounds, that's something that I think people should be concerned about.

And if people are concerned enough, even politicians with very grumpy donors trying to get something done, sometimes answer.

TAPPER: Democratic Senator Sheldon Whitehouse of the great state of Rhode Island, thank you so much for your time today, sir. We appreciate it.

WHITEHOUSE: Thank you, Jake.

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