The Senate voted Tuesday to confirm the first black female judge in Minnesota, over the objections of a top conservative group and a few dozen conservative senators.
Wilhelmina Wright, now a state supreme court justice, was cleared by the Senate to take over as U.S. District Judge for the District of Minnesota. Wright was confirmed 58-36, and the vast majority of Republicans voted against Wright, including Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.
Republican lawmakers voting in favor of the nomination included Sen. David Vitter of Louisiana, Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire, and Joni Ernst and Charles Grassley, both of Iowa.
Her confirmation came despite a warning from Heritage Action for America, which issued a “key vote” alert to Republicans urging them to vote against Wright. The group’s opposition is based in part on 1989 writings she submitted to the UCLA Law Review that some consider racially inflammatory.
In one article, Wright, then a Harvard Law School student, blamed the migration of whites out of cities on then-Supreme Court Justice William Rehnquist and President Ronald Reagan.
“Their mad scramble is aided by a Chief Justice who owned racially restrictive property and a presidential administration that believes bigotry, poverty, and poor educational opportunities for most public school students are the unavoidable fruits of a ‘thriving’ free market economy,” Wright wrote in the UCLA Law Review.
Wright told senators at a confirmation hearing last year her remarks came prior to her years of legal training and experience, and were “inartful.”
Wright’s nomination easily cleared the first hurdle in the Senate thanks to a 2013 change in the Senate rules allowing confirmation of judicial and executive branch nominees with just 51 votes instead of the usual 60 votes.
McConnell green-lighted a vote on Wright after the Senate Judiciary Committee unanimously approved her nomination on Dec. 15. Democrats cheered the move and say Wright is a qualified nominee who deserved a vote.
“Justice Wright is the total package,” said Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., a member of the Judiciary Committee. “Her breadth of experience, deep legal knowledge and strong character make her highly qualified for the position.”
The ranking member on the Judiciary Committee, Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., on Tuesday called Wright, “Extremely qualified, far more qualified than a lot of people.”
