Ed Rendell – Fmr DNC Chair and Governor (D-PA) – Endorses Alito

The following is a transcript from FOX News, 1/24/06

BILL HEMMER: Welcome back here to FOX News”¦Do you believe Sam Alito’s qualified to sit on the U.S. Supreme Court, sir?

ED RENDELL: I believe he’s a qualified judge. He sits on the third circuit court of appeals in Philadelphia. I don’t know if you know this bill, my wife is a third circuit court judge.
HEMMER: I’m aware of that. It should give you pretty good knowledge of him?

RENDELL: Right. She has a high opinion of his integrity and his academic standards. She deals agrees with him on a number of cases and agrees with him on some. I disagree with a lot of his positions on cases, but I think the tests should always be one party wins the election. As long as the Supreme Court justice is appointed who

Governor Edward G. Rendell and First Lady Judge Marjorie O. Rendell.

has high academic qualifications, significant integrity and judge Alito certainly does, we should confirm him regardless of our disagreement on the way he may interpret one aspect of the law. I think we’ve fallen into such partisanship in DC. Not just in this but in so many things, it’s in some way ways tearing the country apart.

HEMMER: How do you think your democrat colleagues did in this process? Were you proud of them?

RENDELL: I wasn’t pleased. Certainly some did well and some didn’t. I wasn’t pleased at the nitpicking. I think we need to go back to the days one party wins. No one fought harder for John Kerry than I did. We they won the election, and as long as they give us qualified candidates, I would have voted not to confirm Clarence Thomas, clearly in my judgment at that time he wasn’t qualified. But Sam Alito unanimously recommended by the American Bar Association, qualified judge. ABA gave him two thumbs up”¦

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