At the end of the day, the senators do have a job.

They do have an obligation and a constitutional responsibility to fully and fairly evaluate these judicial nominees.

Hi, and welcome to Amicus Slate's podcast about the Supreme Court and the courts in the law.

I'm Dahlia Lithwick, and I cover the courts for Slate.

This was another busy week at the U.S. Supreme Court, where despite the fact that the travel ban

lawsuit was not argued and then

dismissed as moot, which is clearly a win for Donald Trump, the justices heard arguments

over whether corporations are liable under the alien tort statute and the scope of the Clean

Water Act. But for soap opera fans, there was a fair amount of giggly coverage

about the degree to which the court's youngest justice, Neil Gorsuch, maybe needs to spend a little

time in the naughty chair for what seems to be a pattern of cutting off his colleagues and saying

things smugly at them. But we wanted to pan back a little bit this week and talk about

the federal judiciary, in part because I think this might be the single most unremarked

win of the Trump era. And it's a win that will have consequences that last for decades.

Donald Trump took office with a whole mess of vacancies,

and we wanted to talk to somebody who could explain to us how Trump is under the radar transforming the federal bench.

This seems like eye glazing inside baseball stuff, but it really isn't. And so I'm so delighted that my guest this week is Kristen Clark.

She's president and executive director of the National Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights

Under Law. You can call it the Lawyers Committee. And she's also one of the sharpest court

watchers in the country. So welcome Kristen to Amicus.

Oh, thank you so much for having me.

So did anything I just said strike you as wrong?

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