Headline

Five Things To Know About US Supreme Court Nominee

Published

4 years ago

February 25, 2022

President Biden has chosen Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson as his pick to replace retiring Justice Stephen Breyer on the U.S. Supreme Court — fulfilling his campaign promise of appointing a Black woman to the nation’s highest court.

Biden formally announced Jackson, 51, as his nominee at the White House on Friday afternoon.

“Judge Jackson is an exceptionally qualified nominee as well as a historic nominee,” the White House said in a statement. “And the Senate should move forward with a fair and timely hearing and confirmation.”

Here are 5 things to know about Jackson.

She clerked for Breyer

A graduate of Harvard Law School, Jackson served as a law clerk to three federal judges, including Breyer on the Supreme Court.

As Breyer’s clerk during the court’s 1999-2000 term, Jackson “learned up close how important it is for a Supreme Court Justice to build consensus and speak to a mainstream understanding of the Constitution,” the White House said in its announcement.

According to the Boston Globe, the 83-year-old Breyer considers Jackson a member of his extended “family.”

Confirmed to her current post with bipartisan support

Biden nominated Jackson to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit last summer, and she was confirmed by the Senate in a 53-44 vote, with Republican Sens. Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina voting in her favor.

But in a tweet early Friday, Graham said that the nomination of Jackson “means the radical Left has won President Biden over yet again.”

Graham had heaped praise on U.S. District Judge J. Michelle Childs, who was speculated to be one of Biden’s leading contenders for the Supreme Court.

“She would be somebody, I think, that could bring the Senate together and probably get more than 60 votes,” Graham said on ABC’s “This Week With George Stephanopoulos” earlier this month. “Anyone else would be problematic.”

Life experiences not race play a role in her work

Born in Washington, D.C., in 1970, Jackson moved to Florida as a young child with her parents, graduates of historically Black colleges and universities who worked as public school teachers.

During her confirmation hearing for the U.S. Court of Appeals, Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, asked Jackson how race would affect her job.

“I don’t think that race plays a role in the kind of judge that I have been and would be. I’m doing a certain thing when I get my cases,” Jackson replied. “I’m looking at the arguments, the facts and the law. I’m methodically and intentionally setting aside personal views [and] any other inappropriate considerations, and I would think that race would be the kind of thing that would be inappropriate to inject into my evaluation of a case.”

Jackson also made it clear that she believed her perspective was still crucial to the court.

“I’ve experienced life in perhaps a different way than some of my colleagues because of who I am, and that might be valuable — I hope it would be valuable — if I was confirmed to the court,” she said.

She was a public defender

If confirmed, Jackson would be the first Supreme Court justice since Thurgood Marshall to have represented indigent criminal defendants.

During her April confirmation hearing, Jackson discussed how her experience as a public defender would benefit her approach to cases on the bench.

“One of the things that I do now is I take extra care to communicate with the defendants who come before me in the courtroom,” Jackson said. “I speak to them directly, and not just to their lawyers. I use their names.”

In addition to her public-defender work, Jackson served as vice chairman of the U.S. Sentencing Commission, working to reduce the penalties for crack cocaine offenders.

Ordered Trump’s former counsel to testify in his impeachment inquiry
In her work as a federal judge, one of Jackson’s most prominent rulings was a 2019 decision in which she ordered former Trump White House counsel Don McGahn to testify in the impeachment inquiry against then-President Donald Trump.

McGahn, a key witness in Robert Mueller’s investigation, was called to testify by the House Judiciary Committee to determine if there were grounds for Trump’s impeachment. Trump ordered McGahn not to testify on the grounds that his role as the president’s close adviser had granted him immunity.

In her 118-page decision, Jackson declared that immunity “simply does not exist,” even for the commander in chief.

“Presidents are not kings,” she wrote. “This means that they do not have subjects bound by loyalty or blood, whose destiny they are entitled to control.”

She’s related by marriage to Paul Ryan
Jackson met her husband, Patrick Jackson, when the two were at Harvard College. He is a surgeon and they have two daughters.

His twin brother is the brother-in-law of Janna Ryan, wife of former House Speaker Paul Ryan.

“Janna and I are incredibly happy for Ketanji and her entire family,” Ryan tweeted on Friday. “Our politics may differ, but my praise for Ketanji’s intellect, for her character, and for her integrity, is unequivocal.”

Headline

Nnamdi Kanu’s Case Proof Of Religious Persecution In Nigeria – US lawmaker, John James

Published

23 hours ago

November 20, 2025

Editor

Former chairman of the Africa Subcommittee and now a member of the Energy and Commerce Committee, Representative, John James, has claimed that the case of Nnamdi Kanu, the leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB, is proof of religious persecution in Nigeria.

James stated this when the United States House Subcommittee on Africa on Thursday, held a public hearing to review President Donald Trump’s recent redesignation of Nigeria as a Country of Particular Concern.

The hearing in Washington, DC included senior US State Department officials and Nigerian religious leaders.

James claimed that in the case of Nnamdi Kanu, Nigeria’s Court of Appeal had struck down the charges against him and ordered his release in 2022.

He said: “Religious persecution is tied to political repression and weakening institutions in Nigeria. The detention of Mazi Nnamdi Kanu is a clear example.

“In 2022, Nigeria’s Court of Appeals struck down the charges against him and ordered his release.

“The UN Working Group for Arbitrary Detention has also called for his unconditional release, yet he remains in solitary confinement in deteriorating health and recently had to represent himself in court.

“Nigeria has signaled that the law is optional and targeting Christians is fair game. Just hours ago this morning, despite the pleas and cries of Nigerian people and many Nigerian lawmakers, Kanu was convicted on all charges.”

Nnamdi Kanu was on Thursday, sentenced to life imprisonment over terrorism charges.

Headline

Nigerians Don’t Trust Their Govt – US Congressman Riley Moore

Published

23 hours ago

November 20, 2025

Editor

US Congressman Riley Moore has said that Nigerian people do not trust their government.

Moore stated this on Thursday at US House of Representatives Subcommittee on Africa, which is investigating Trump’s redesignation of Nigeria as a ‘Country of Particular Concern’, CPC.

“The Nigerian people don’t trust their government. ‘How can you trust a government that doesn’t show up when you ask them to?

“The Nigerian government must work with the US in cooperation to address these insecurity issues.

“A case that just happened recently in Plateau state. We had a pastor there who warned the Nigerian government that they were under attack. There’s imminent attack forces here in the next 24 hours. Please come and help us.

“The Nigerian government did not only ignore it but put up a press release that it is fake news,” he said.

Moore would be meeting with a delegation of senior members of the Nigerian government, over the devastating insecurity in Nigeria and the US designation of the country as CPC, DAILY POST reports.

Headline

US Makes U-turn, To Attend G20 Summit In South Africa

Published

23 hours ago

November 20, 2025

Editor

In an 11th-hour about-turn, the United States has told South Africa it wants to take part in this weekend’s G20 summit in Johannesburg, President Cyril Ramaphosa said Thursday.

President Donald Trump’s administration had said it would not take part in the November 22-23 meeting and that no final statement by G20 leaders could be issued without its presence.

It has clashed with South Africa over various international and domestic policies this year, extending its objections to Pretoria’s G20 priorities for the meeting of leading economies being held for the first time in Africa.

“We have received notice from the United States, a notice which we are still in discussions with them over, about a change of mind about participating in one shape, form or other in the summit,” Ramaphosa told reporters.

“This comes at the late hour before the summit begins. And so therefore, we do need to engage in those types of discussions to see how practical it is and what it finally really means,” he said.

There was no immediate confirmation from US officials.

Ramaphosa said: “We still need to engage with them to understand fully what their participation at the 11th hour means and how it will manifest itself.”

In a note to the government on Saturday, the US embassy repeated that it would not attend the summit, saying South Africa’s G20 priorities “run counter to the US policy views and we cannot support consensus on any documents negotiated under your presidency”.

Ramaphosa said earlier Thursday that South Africa would not be bullied.

“It cannot be that a country’s geographical location or income or army determines who has a voice and who is spoken down to,” he told delegates at a G20 curtain-raiser event.

There “should be no bullying of one nation by another”, he said.

– ‘Positive sign’ –
Ramaphosa said the apparent change of heart was “a positive sign”.

“All countries are here, and the United States, the biggest economy in the world, needs to be here,” he said.

South Africa chose “Solidarity, Equality, Sustainability” as the theme of its presidency of the G20, which comprises 19 countries and two regional bodies, the European Union and the African Union.

Its agenda focuses on strengthening disaster resilience, improving debt sustainability for low-income countries, financing a “just energy transition” and harnessing “critical minerals for inclusive growth and sustainable development”.

After early objections from Washington, it vowed to press on with its programme and its aim to find consensus on a leaders’ statement on the outcome of the discussions.

“We will not be told by anyone who is absent that we cannot adopt a declaration or make any decisions at the summit,” Foreign Minister Ronald Lamola said Thursday.

Trump has singled out South Africa for harsh treatment on a number of issues since he returned to the White House in January, notably making debunked claims of white Afrikaners being systematically “killed and slaughtered” in the country.

He expelled South Africa’s ambassador in March and has imposed 30 percent trade tariffs, the highest in sub-Saharan Africa.

US businesses were well represented at a separate Business 20 (B20) event that wound up in Johannesburg Thursday.

The head of the US Chamber of Commerce, Suzanne Clark, thanked South Africa for fostering “real collaboration between G20 nations during a time of rapid change” during its rotating presidency, which transfers to the United States for 2026.

“The US Chamber of Commerce will use our B20 leadership to foster international collaboration,” Clark said.

The United States has significant business interests in South Africa with more than 600 US companies operating in the country, according to the South African embassy in Washington.

G20 members account for 85 percent of global GDP and around two-thirds of the world’s population.