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Senator Lott drawing fire again on race from civil rights groups
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| Contributor | The Sunset Provision |
| Last Edited | The Sunset Provision Sep 07, 2007 12:16am |
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| Category | News |
| News Date | Friday, September 7, 2007 06:15:00 AM UTC0:0 |
| Description | When Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) broke ranks and voted with Judiciary Committee Republicans in August to back the most contentious judicial nominee of the 110th Congress, she surprised nearly everyone with a stake in the battle. Everyone, perhaps, except Republican Whip Trent Lott of Mississippi.
Prior to the vote, Feinstein didn’t inform Lott that she had planned to give the decisive vote to back the nomination of Mississippian Leslie Southwick, and she insists that Lott was not influential in allaying her concerns.
“I assuage my own concerns, and I do that on everyone,” Feinstein told The Hill on Thursday. “I have my own brain, and I try and use it.”
Behind the scenes, however, Lott was instrumental in working with Southwick to write a letter responding to concerns raised by the civil rights community about his record on racial issues, two GOP aides say. Feinstein, who asked Southwick to address those concerns in writing, read the letter during the Aug. 2 Judiciary Committee vote.
That letter helped win over Feinstein to support the nomination. But it did nothing to ease the anger within the civil rights community and in the Congressional Black Caucus, which, according to Chairwoman Carolyn Kilpatrick (D-Mich.), is planning to address the Senate Democratic Caucus behind closed doors to urge Democrats to derail the nomination. For Lott, handling the anger from the black community is a particularly acute issue. Nearly five years ago, Lott faced a political uproar over his comments that the United States would have avoided “all these problems” had then-segregationist Sen. Strom Thurmond (R-S.C.) been elected president in 1948.
Lott later apologized, saying his comments about Thurmond were misconstrued, and went on the offensive to mend relations with the black community. But with little political support and under intense pressure, he was forced to relinquish his spot as the top Republican in the chamber.
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