Leahy, Sessions Announce Witness List For Sotomayor Hearing – scheduled to begin on July 13 at 10:00 a.m

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) and Ranking Member Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) Thursday announced the witness list for the confirmation hearing for Judge Sonia Sotomayor to be an Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.

The confirmation hearing is scheduled to begin on July 13 at 10:00 a.m.  The lists of witnesses invited by the Majority and Minority of the Judiciary Committee follow.  A panel of witnesses from the American Bar Association will also testify.  For more information about the Supreme Court, the Sotomayor nomination, and hearing details, visit the Senate Judiciary Committee website.

American Bar Association Witnesses

Kim Askew, Chair of Standing Committee
Mary Boies, Primary Reviewer

Majority Witnesses
(Biographies Below)

Michael Bloomberg, Mayor, City of New York
Chuck Canterbury, National President, Fraternal Order of Police
David Cone, former Major League Baseball pitcher
JoAnne A. Epps, Dean, Temple University Beasley School of Law, on behalf of the National Association of Women Lawyers
Louis Freeh, former Director, Federal Bureau of Investigation
Michael J. Garcia, former U.S. Attorney, Southern District of New York
Wade Henderson, President and CEO of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights
Patricia Hynes, President, New York City Bar Association
Dustin McDaniel, Attorney General, State of Arkansas
Robert Morgenthau, District Attorney, New York County, New York
Ramona Romero, National President, Hispanic National Bar Association
Congressman Jose E. Serrano, New York 16^th District
Theodore M. Shaw, Professor, Columbia Law School
Kate Stith, Lafayette S. Foster Professor of Law, Yale Law School
Congresswoman Nydia Velázquez, Chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus.

Minority Witnesses

Linda Chavez, President, Center for Equal Opportunity
Sandy Froman, Esq., Former President, National Rifle Association of America
Dr. Stephen Halbrook, Attorney
Tim Jeffries, Founder, P7 Enterprises
Peter Kirsanow, Commissioner, U.S. Commission on Civil Rights
David Kopel, Esq., Independence Institute
John McGinnis, Professor, Northwestern University School of Law
Neomi Rao, Professor, George Mason University School of Law
Frank Ricci, Director of Fire Services, ConnectiCOSH (Connecticut Council on Occupational Safety and Health)
David Rivkin, Esq., Partner, Baker Hostetler
Nick Rosenkranz, Professor, Georgetown University School of Law
Ilya Somin, Professor, George Mason University School of Law
Lieutenant Ben Vargas, New Haven Fire Department
Dr. Charmaine Yoest, Americans United for Life

A memorandum providing guidance for the hearings will be available Thursday afternoon.  Guidelines for media and public attendance at the hearings are available online.

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Biographies For Majority Witnesses At Sotomayor Hearing

Biographies for witnesses invited to testify by the Senate Judiciary Committee Majority follow.

Michael Bloomberg. Mr. Bloomberg is the mayor of New York City.  First elected in 2001, he is now in his third term as mayor.  He began his career with Salomon Brothers, an investment bank in New York City where he worked for 15 years.  In 1981, he founded Bloomberg LP. Today, more than 250,000 people subscribe to its financial news and information service. Headquartered in New York City, the company now has employees in more than 100 cities.  Mayor Bloomberg is a graduate of Johns Hopkins University and Harvard Business School.

Chuck Canterbury. Mr. Canterbury is the National President of the Fraternal Order of Police, one of the Nation’s largest and most prominent voices for law enforcement officers.  Mr. Canterbury has served in numerous capacities in the organization, including National Vice President and National Second Vice President.  Mr. Canterbury has 25 years of experience in law enforcement as a police officer in Horry County, South Carolina.  He was also appointed by President George W. Bush to serve on the Medal of Valor Board, and he serves on the Homeland Security Council.

David Cone. Mr. Cone is a former Major League Baseball pitcher. Fifteen years ago, in August 1994, a 232-day baseball strike began, leading to the cancellation of the 1994 World Series, which was the first since 1904.  During the strike, Mr. Cone became one of the players union’s most active and visible members, testifying before Congress in January of 1995 against baseball’s Antitrust Exemption.

JoAnne A. Epps. Ms. Epps is the Dean at the Temple University Beasley School of Law.  She has been a frequent speaker on Evidence and Advocacy, both domestically and internationally.  Dean Epps is a member of the American Law Institute, and is active in professional organizations. She is an officer of the American Bar Association Section of Litigation and recently completed a term as a member of the ABA Standing Committee on Continuing Legal Education (2004-2007). Before joining the Temple faculty in 1985, she was a Deputy City Attorney for the City of Los Angeles (1976-1980) and an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania (1980-1985). Her primary teaching areas include Criminal Procedure, Evidence and Trial Advocacy.  She will testify on behalf of the National Women Lawyers Association.

Louis Freeh. Mr. Freeh served as the Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation from 1993 to 2001.  Mr. Freeh began his career as an FBI Special Agent and later an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York.  Subsequently, he held positions in the U.S. Attorney’s Office as Chief of the Organized Crime Unit, Deputy U.S. Attorney, and Associate U.S. Attorney.  In July 1991, former President George H.W. Bush appointed Mr. Freeh to be U.S. District Court Judge for the Southern District of New York. While serving as a district court judge, he was nominated to be the Director of the FBI by President Clinton.  After leaving the FBI in 2001, he moved into the private sector and in 2007, he founded the Freeh Group International and its affiliated law firm, Freeh Sporkin & Sullivan LLP, where he serves as Senior Managing Partner.  He is a graduate of Rutgers College and Rutgers Law School in 1974 and later received his LL.M. degree from New York University Law School.

Michael J. Garcia. Mr. Garcia served as the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York from 2005 to 2008.  As U.S. Attorney, he supervised more than 230 federal prosecutors and directed the investigation of some of the world’s most high-profile cases involving securities fraud, racketeering and counterfeiting.  These investigations included whether the multitrillion-dollar credit-default swap market was illegally manipulated.  Earlier this year, Mr. Garcia joined the law firm of Kirkland & Ellis as a partner in its New York office.  He is a graduate of the State University of New York at Binghamton, the College of William and Mary and Albany Law School.

Wade Henderson. Mr. Henderson is the president and CEO of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, and counselor to the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights Education Fund.  The Leadership Conference is the nation’s premier civil and human rights coalition. Mr. Henderson is also the Joseph L. Rauh, Jr., Professor of Public Interest Law at the David A. Clarke School of Law, University of the District of Columbia.  Prior to his role with the Leadership Conference, Mr. Henderson was the Washington Bureau director of the NAACP.  In that capacity, he directed the government affairs and national legislative program of the NAACP.  Mr. Henderson is a graduate of Howard University and the Rutgers University School of Law.

Patricia Hynes. Ms. Hynes is the President of the City Bar of New York.  The New York City Bar Association, founded in 1870 and with a current membership of 23,000, is the oldest and largest Bar Association in New York.  The City Bar is dedicated to maintaining the high ethical standards of the profession, promoting reform of the law, and providing service to the profession and the public.  Ms. Hynes is also Senior Counsel at Allen & Overy LLP.  She is a graduate of Queens College, University of the City of New York and Fordham University School of Law.

Dustin McDaniel. Mr. McDaniel is the Attorney General of Arkansas.  He took office in January 2007, and he is the youngest Attorney General in the nation.  He is the Chair of the southern region for the National Association of Attorneys General; Co-Chair of the Democratic Association of Attorneys General; and has been awarded an Aspen-Rodel Fellowship in Public Leadership.  Prior to becoming Attorney General, Mr. McDaniel served as a uniformed patrol officer in his hometown of Jonesboro, Arkansas. He was also a Democratic Member of the Arkansas House of Representatives, serving as the Chairman of the Joint Select Committee on Health Insurance and Prescription Drugs and as a Member of the House Public Health, Welfare and Labor Committee.  He is a graduate of the University of Arkansas and the University of Arkansas at Little Rock Bowen School of Law.

Robert Morgenthau. Mr. Morgenthau has served as the District Attorney for New York County, New York—the “Manhattan District Attorney”—since 1975.  Earlier this year, after a long and storied career, Mr. Morgenthau announced that he would not seek a tenth term.  A veteran of World War II, he graduated from Amherst College and Yale Law School.

Ramona Romero. Ms. Romero is the National President of the Hispanic National Bar Association.  The Hispanic National Bar Association (HNBA) is an incorporated, not-for-profit, national membership organization that represents the interests of the more than 100,000 Hispanic attorneys, judges, law professors, legal assistants, and law students in the U.S. and its territories. Since its founding in 1971, the HNBA has acted as a force for positive change within the legal profession. It does so by encouraging Latino students to choose a career in the law and by promoting their advancement within the profession once they graduate and start practicing.  Ms. Romero is also Corporate Counsel, Logistics and Energy at DuPont.  She is a graduate of Barnard College, Columbia University and Harvard Law School.

Congressman José E. Serrano. U.S. Representative José E. Serrano represents the Sixteenth Congressional District of New York in the Bronx . He served on the House Appropriations Committee and is also Chairman of the Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government . Congressman Serrano is also Senior Whip for the Majority Whip operation and an active member of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus; he served as Chair of the Caucus from 1993-94. He is now the most senior Member of Congress of Puerto Rican descent.

Theodore M. Shaw. Mr. Shaw is a Professor of Professional Practice at Columbia Law School.  He is the former Director-Counsel and President of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, Inc. (LDF).  Founded by Thurgood Marshall in 1940, LDF is the nation’s premier civil rights law firm.  On May 1, 2004, Mr. Shaw became the fifth person to lead the organization in its 65-year history.  He began his legal career in the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. Department of Justice.  Joining LDF in 1982, Mr. Shaw directed LDF’s education docket and litigated school desegregation, economic justice, capital punishment, and other civil rights cases throughout the country.  In 1990, he left LDF to join the faculty of the University of Michigan Law School, where he taught constitutional law, civil procedure, and civil rights.  In 1993, he rejoined LDF as Associate Director-Counsel.  He is a graduate of Wesleyan University and the Columbia University School of Law. 

Kate Stith. Ms. Stith is the Lafayette S. Foster Professor of Law at Yale Law School, where she teaches and writes in the areas of criminal law, criminal procedure, and constitutional law. Prior to joining the faculty at Yale, Professor Stith was an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, where she prosecuted white-collar and organized crime cases. Her book on the federal sentencing guidelines, “Fear of Judging” (with J.A. Cabranes), was awarded a Certificate of Merit by the ABA in 1999. A graduate of Dartmouth College, the Kennedy School of Government, and Harvard Law School, she clerked for Judge Carl McGowan of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia and for Supreme Court Justice Byron R. White.

Congresswoman Nydia Velázquez. Congresswoman Velázquez is the Chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus.  Congresswoman Nydia M. Velázquez is currently serving her ninth term as Representative for New York’s 12th Congressional District.  She is the Chairwoman of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, Chair of the House Small Business Committee and a senior member of the Financial Service Committee. In 1992, she was the first Puerto Rican woman elected to the U.S. House of Representatives. Congresswoman Velázquez was born in Yabucoa, and started school early, skipped several grades, and became the first person in her family to receive a college diploma. At the age of 16, she entered the University of Puerto Rico in Rio Piedras. She graduated magna cum laude in 1974 with a degree in political science. After earning a master’s degree on scholarship from N.Y.U., Velázquez taught Puerto Rican studies at CUNY’s Hunter College in 1981.

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