Behind the dark-money web that put Barrett (and Kavanaugh and Gorsuch) on the Supreme Court

[marmar]

Behind the dark-money web that put Barrett (and Kavanaugh and Gorsuch) on the Supreme Court
Neil and Ann Corkery have a mission: Load up the judicial branch with right-wing Catholics. It's definitely working

By JON SKOLNIK
MARCH 30, 2021 10:10AM


(Salon) During Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett's confirmation hearings last year, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., at the time ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, expressed concern over Barrett's religious affiliation as a pious Roman Catholic identified with her church's most conservative elements. "I think whatever a religion is, it has its own dogma," Feinstein said, addressing Barrett directly. "In your case, professor, when you read your speeches, the conclusion one draws is that the dogma lives loudly within you."

Feinstein was widely criticized for those remarks, which may not have been artfully phrased. But Barrett's confirmation did more than solidify a 6-3 conservative majority on the Supreme Court. She also became at least the sixth Catholic among the nine justices currently sitting on the court. Like Justices Brett Kavanaugh and Neil Gorsuch, former President Trump's previous nominees, Barrett is visibly someone who understands the law through a religious and specifically Christian lens. (Gorsuch's religious affiliation is not entirely clear: He was raised Catholic but has attended Episcopal churches for most of his adult life. But even without counting him, the court is disproportionately Catholic: Barrett, Kavanaugh, Sonia Sotomayor, Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas and Chief Justice John Roberts.)

The three new justices of the Trump era have been accused of blatant disregard for the separation of church and state. But the fact that they arrived at such positions of power is perhaps less concerning than exactly how they did. As with so much in conservative politics, their ascension was facilitated by a byzantine web of right-wing dark money, operating with little to no accountability.

Meet Neil and Ann Corkery, a pair of veteran Republican operatives who have cultivated a robust network of conservative and Catholic-affiliated nonprofits, charities and funds notable for their near-total opacity. For more than a decade, the Corkerys have leveraged this network to prop up conservative judicial nominees, most of whom have been devout Catholics. Robert Maguire, research director at Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), told Salon that "while most Americans wouldn't recognize their names," the Corkerys "have been the overseers of massive amounts of money that have gone into federal judicial races." .................(more)

https://www.salon.com/2021/03/30/behind-the-dark-money-web-that-put-barrett-and-kavanaugh-and-gorsuch-on-the-supreme-court/

[Sibelius Fan]

1. As the nation becomes thankfully less religious, the Christians/Catholics

are doing everything in their power to keep their white supremacist power by installing Bronze-Age thought in our legal system.

[multigraincracker]

2. Too bad there no rich

Fransicans.

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

3. K&R