Republicans are criticizing the Biden administration for withholding material from the Senate Judiciary Committee concerning a child porn case in which Supreme Court candidate Ketanji Brown Jackson sentenced the defendant to the mandatory minimum sentence until after her confirmation hearing.
While serving as a judge on the DC district court, Lucas Cane was caught with 6,500 files of elementary, middle, and high school students engaging in sexual behaviors and was sentenced to 60 months in prison.
Cane, on the other hand, had been recommended for an 84-month term by the federal probation office.
Last year, as she was ready to be elevated to the DC appeals court, Jackson, who is poised to become the first black woman to sit on the Supreme Court if approved, handed down the punishment.
This case, which Judge Jackson omitted from her list of child abuse cases, not only undermines Judge Jackson’s argument that she followed the probation office’s recommended sentences, but it also highlights the dangers of moving too quickly through the vetting process, according to a Republican Judiciary Committee aide.
During her confirmation hearing last week, Republican Senators Ted Cruz of Texas, Josh Hawley of Missouri, and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina grilled Jackson on her record on sentencing child sex crimes. The lawmakers cited seven incidents in which Jackson sentenced offenders to terms that were less than what prosecutors and probation officers had recommended, although none of those cases involved Cane.
The Biden administration claimed the omission was inadvertent, but that Cane’s sentence was in line with federal prosecutors’ demands.
Bates also said that some Republicans who attacked Jackson’s sentences during the hearing voted for Trump-nominated judges who handed down similar terms to individuals charged with the same crimes.
During his questioning of Jackson last week, Cruz provided a table showing that the judge had imposed penalties that were 14 percent to 64 percent lower than what the prosecutor had requested in several cases.
