Jeremiah Smith: “I remember Clarence Thomas and people going in to find out what videos he purchased. He had a family. And Robert Bork…”

“I remember Clarence Thomas and people going in to find out what videos he purchased. He had a family. And Robert Bork had a family. And Doug Ginsburg had a family. I remember some very nasty things being said about those nominees. We are looking at court cases of these nominees, and that is all we are looking at. I have not said, nor has anyone said on the Senate floor, one word about their personal lives. I have no desire to go there. This is about their court cases. In terms of Judge Paez in particular, his judicial philosophy, his activist philosophy, I will use his own words: I appreciate the need for courts to act when they must. When the issue has been generated as a result of a failure of the political process to resolve a certain political question, there is no choice but for the courts to resolve the question that perhaps ideally and preferably should be resolved through the legislative process. The legislative process is to write the laws. That is what we do here. It is not up to the courts to write the laws. It is up to the legislature to write the laws.”