Rep. Chu Statement on Nomination of Neil Gorsuch

Washington, DC – Rep. Judy Chu (CA-27) has released the following statement on the nomination of Judge Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court:

"After rewriting the rules of our democracy to please their base, Republicans took the unprecedented step of not even holding a hearing for President Obama's Supreme Court nominee based on the convenient fiction that presidents only have constitutional authority for three years. Now, having stolen this Supreme Court seat, Republicans should use the chance to consider somebody with the same bipartisan appeal as Merrick Garland. Instead, Donald Trump nominated Judge Neil Gorsuch, a man with a record hostile to women's rights, and a propensity to side with the interests of big corporations over workers and consumers.

"Judge Gorsuch's work in the Hobby Lobby case is of particular concern. Already, Donald Trump is trying to undermine our first amendment by eschewing equal protection and promoting Christians and Christianity above all others. Judge Gorsuch's support for the Hobby Lobby ruling, then, which said that corporations can act as though they hold religious believes gives reason to believe that Trump sees him as a vital part of his war on equal rights.

"I believe that Judge Gorsuch deserves the opportunity for a hearing that Republicans unjustly denied to Merrick Garland. And it is my hope that, in those hearings, Senators seek clarity on his opinions on equal protection, freedom of religion, and the decades-long constitutional precedent that women have a right to make their own health care choices."