Yesterday we wrote about a radio ad attacking Florida Republican Reps. Adam Putnam and John Mica for not denouncing radio personality Rush Limbaugh for calling Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor a "racist" and a "bigot." We found that the ad was accurate in capturing the words of Limbaugh and in its description of the historical significance of Sotomayor’s nomination. We left it to readers to determine how responsible the congressmen were for Limbaugh’s words. After... Click to Read the Full Post
Independent groups are taking to the airwaves to weigh in on the debate over Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor, whose confirmation hearings began July 13 in the Senate. The liberal Change Campaign Committee and Hispanic group Presente.org are airing a Spanish-language radio ad in Florida. The groups also posted the ad, with a translation and some video, on YouTube: Two versions of the ad take Republican Reps. John Mica and Adam Putnam to task for not denouncing the words of radio host Rush Limbaugh,... Click to Read the Full Post
Sonia Sotomayor isn’t mentioned in the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision today in a much-watched reverse-discrimination case, Ricci v. DeStefano. But you can bet the decision will be mentioned plenty in the upcoming Senate confirmation hearing that could put her on that court. Sotomayor and two other judges on the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals had upheld a lower court decision in the case, saying that the city of New Haven, Conn., was on firm legal ground when it threw out the results... Click to Read the Full Post
We’ve updated our Ask FactCheck item on Sonia Sotomayor and gun rights yet again. This time it’s to reflect the fact that the National Rifle Association has filed a cert petition asking the Supreme Court to hear its case challenging Chicago’s gun laws (which it lost this week in the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals). The NRA asks the court specifically to decide the question of whether or not the Second Amendment applies to state and local governments. Actually, the Supreme Court... Click to Read the Full Post
We’ve just updated our recent Ask FactCheck item on Sonia Sotomayor and the Second Amendment to reflect the latest news: A ruling by three judges on the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals agreeing with her judgment that the amendment doesn’t apply to state and local governments. The decision in National Rifle Association v. Chicago takes some of the air out of the argument, put forward by the NRA and others, that Sotomayor is anti-gun rights. Sotomayor and two other 2nd Circuit judges... Click to Read the Full Post
Summary Both the Coalition for Constitutional Values, a liberal group supporting Sonia Sotomayor’s nomination to the Supreme Court, and the Judicial Confirmation Network, a conservative organization that opposes President Obama’s choice, have ads up attempting to enhance or undermine her confirmation prospects. The ads are accurate and civil. JCN’s spot, which is running only on the Internet at this point, quotes extensively from Sotomayor’s own remarks about how she hoped... Click to Read the Full Post
