Kennedy, Kavanaugh, and the Future of National Security Before the Supreme Court
The Lawfare Podcast
The Lawfare Institute
4.7 • 6.4K Ratings
🗓️ 25 July 2018
⏱️ 57 minutes
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Summary
Justice Kennedy's resignation and the nomination of Judge Brett Kavanaugh as his replacement promises to usher in a new era of the U.S. Supreme Court, not least in the areas of foreign relations and national security law. To hash out what these changes might mean, Lawfare senior editor Scott R. Anderson spoke with Jen Mascott of the Antonin Scalia School of Law at George Mason University, Steve Vladeck of the University of Texas at Austin School of Law, and former Department of Justice official Bob Loeb, currently a partner at the law firm of Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | The following podcast contains advertising. |
| 0:04.0 | To access an ad-free version of the LawFair podcast, |
| 0:08.0 | become a material supporter of LawFair at patreon.com slash law fair. |
| 0:14.0 | That's patreon.com slash law fair. |
| 0:18.0 | Also, check out LawFair's other podcast offerings, |
| 0:22.0 | rational security, chatter, law fair no bull, and the aftermath. |
| 0:30.0 | For all of the discussion of just how careful Kavanaugh is about deferring the Congress and taking the statute seriously, |
| 0:40.0 | imagine a content of 15 years Democrats control both houses of Congress and the White House, |
| 0:45.0 | and are pushing aggressive legislation through that actually runs into some of Judge Kavanaugh's ideological and constitutional commitments. |
| 0:53.0 | I don't think he's going to be shy at all as he hasn't been in the appointments, |
| 0:58.0 | and he's going to be in the comments clause and removal context of not deferring to Congress and the executive |
| 1:05.0 | mentioned those concepts. |
| 1:07.0 | I don't think it's right to portray him as someone who generally defers the political branch. |
| 1:11.0 | I think it's better to portray him as someone who defers when he thinks courts have less of a role to play. |
| 1:16.0 | And national security is just about categorically an area where he thinks that that's the appropriate way forward. |
| 1:22.0 | And the court is for the next 15, 20, 25 years, I think it puts a lot of pressure on the justice who I think would then become the median among the current court. |
| 1:31.0 | And I think that's Chief Justice John Roberts to try to sort of split the difference and not totally cut off a meaningful judicial role in the national security context. |
| 1:41.0 | And that to me is going to be where the big flights are in the Supreme Court and national security litigation in the near future. |
| 1:47.0 | I'm Scott Ari Anderson and you're listening to the Lawfare Podcast for July 24, 2018. |
| 1:53.0 | Justice Kennedy's resignation and the nomination of Judge Brett Kavanaugh's replacement promises to usher in a new era on the US Supreme Court, |
| 2:01.0 | not least in the areas of foreign relations and national security law that we focus on here at Lawfare. |
| 2:05.0 | To hash out what these changes on the court may mean, I spoke to Jen Mascott of the Antonin Scalia School of Law, George Mason University, Steve Laddack to the School of Law at the University of Texas at Austin, |
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