LCCR Unveils TV Ad Opposing Janice Rogers Brown

Washington – The Leadership Conference on Civil Rights (LCCR), the nation’s oldest, largest and most diverse civil and human rights coalition, unveiled a new television ad campaign highlighting the abysmal record of California Supreme Court Justice Janice Rogers Brown at a news conference at the National Press Club this afternoon. LCCR was joined by the NAACP’s Hilary Shelton, the National Partnership for Women & Families’ Debra L. Ness and AFSCME’s Irasema Garza.

“The Leadership Conference on Civil Rights has fought hard for the advancement of women and minorities,” said Wade Henderson, LCCR’s Executive Director. “But as LCCR’s new ad affirms, in America we don’t confirm our judges based on who they are or where they come from. We strive to appoint judges who respect and honor the law. It is clear from her record that Janice Rogers Brown does neither.”

As one of President Bush’s most radical nominees, Janice Rogers Brown was at the heart of the nuclear option battle that threatened to destroy our system of checks and balances. She has suggested that modest affirmative action programs somehow resemble “Jim Crow” laws that once mandated racial segregation in the southern United States. She has attacked Social Security as a system that cannibalizes children and has likened minimum wage and national labor relations laws to a “socialist revolution.” Even conservative columnist George Will admits, “Janice Rogers Brown is out of the mainstream.” [Washington Post, 5/26/06]

The 30-second spot will run for one week and begin airing today on BET, CNN, FOX and MSNBC in Washington and tomorrow in Maine, Rhode Island, and Nebraska. The spot highlights Rogers Brown’s harsh attacks on individual rights, Social Security, health and safety laws. It refutes those who have cravenly promoted Roger Brown’s skin color and gender as primary qualifications for a lifetime appointment to one of our nation’s highest courts.

“Republican leaders should be ashamed,” said Henderson. “They have employed a cynical strategy to push her race and gender to the forefront while hiding her appalling record. We’ve seen this before – it’s a page out of the Clarence Thomas playbook.”

Rogers Brown has been nominated to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, which is widely regarded as the second most important court in the United States, after the U.S. Supreme Court. Nearly 150 national and state organizations oppose her nomination, including the Urban League, NAACP, National Bar Association, National Partnership for Women & Families, NOW, and the National Women’s Law Center.
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The ad can be viewed here