Rubio Kills Nomination Of Gay African-American Judge To Appease The Far Right
Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) has withdrawn his support of a gay African-American judge from Miami who was poised to make the leap to the federal bench, and possibly savaged the nominee’s professional reputation in the process. According to the New York Times, critics of the decision are crying foul, saying that Rubio is playing politics with the nomination to win back the support of the far right.
Rubio was in favor of Judge William Thomas’ nomination before he was against it. The junior Senator supported President Barack Obama’s choice to appoint Thomas to the Federal District Court for the Southern District of Florida 10 months ago, but that was before Rubio saw his credibility with far-right conservatives wither over his support of comprehensive immigration reform.
Now, suddenly, Rubio’s office is citing Thomas’ handling of two criminal cases as the Senator’s reason for suddenly turning cold on the nomination, officially dooming its chances of going through. Thomas — who grew up living on food stamps in a Philadelphia family of 10 children — would have been the first African-American openly gay man to sit on the federal bench.
“As much as I would like to think that politics has nothing to do with this, it looks as if it does,” said attorney Yolanda Strader to the Times. Strader is president of Miami’s largest association of African-American attorneys.
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http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/09/24/rubio-kills-nomination-of-gay-african-american-judge-to-appease-the-far-right/
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