ABC’s "Nightline" on Thursday celebrated Sonia Sotomayor’s confirmation to the
Supreme Court as a "Jackie Robinson moment" and also highlighted cheering crowds
at an event put on by the left-wing
Puerto
Rican Legal Defense Fund (PRLDF). Correspondent John Donvan failed to
identify the liberal bent of the organization, which has vociferously lobbied
for
abortion
rights, though he did note that Sotomayor served on the group’s board.
In addition to comparing Sotomayor’s confirmation to Jackie Robinson’s entry
into baseball, Donvan actually brought on Democratic operative-turned-ABC
journalist George Stephanopoulos to reference what it was like for Greek
Americans when Michael Dukakis ran for President in 1988. Stephanopoulos
enthused, "There was something that trumped the politics, the partisanship. I
knew a lot of Republican Greeks who were supporting a Democrat for first time
just because he was one of them."
Donvan described the Greek American Stephanopoulos as "
somebody who should
know" what it felt like. But he failed to specifically mention that the ABC
host also worked for the Dukakis campaign at the time. Earlier in the piece,
Donvan raved, "And while this is definitely a Latino thing, it is also, we
should say, an American thing....Call it a Jackie Robinson moment, to borrow a
lesson from sports."
The Nightline reporter dismissed complaints about Sotomayor during
confirmation hearings, including her "Wise Latina" remark, as "
mostly
predictable questions." At a PRLDF gathering to celebrate the Senate vote,
ABC featured footage of the assembled crowd wearing shirts reading "Wise
Latina." New York Supreme Court judge Laura Visitacion-Lewis extolled the
now-famous
2001
comment, in which Sotomayor suggested that a "wise Latina woman" would come
to a better conclusion than a white man.
Ms. Visitacion-Lewis breezily explained the T-shirts: "We feel that this is
the way of showing that that remark was not one that should be relegated to
something that has to be disowned or has to mean something negative. Our
experiences can be richer simply because they're different."
A transcript of the August 6 segment, which aired at 11:56pm, follows:
MARTIN BASHIR: After months of debate
over her qualifications and judgments, Judge Sonia Sotomayor ended today with
her Senate confirmation. Making history as the first Hispanic justice to sit on
the nation's highest court. President Obama said he was deeply gratified by the
barrier-breaking milestone. It is, after all, one he knows very well. As John
Donvan now reports.
SENATOR AL FRANKEN (D-MN): The nomination of Sonia Sotomayor of New York to
be an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States is
confirmed.
DONVAN: Talk about anti-climactic. As they counted the Senators' votes today,
it had been ten weeks already since the President had named his nominee.
PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA: Judge Sonia Sotomayor.
DONVAN: And the hearings, they had been an endurance test in mostly
predictable questions.
SENATOR JOHN CORNYN (R-TX): You said that a wise Latino woman would reach a
better conclusion than a male counterpart.
DONVAN: The outcome? Confirmation was so foreseeable that it just never
could quite be a fireworks moment. Except here in the Bronx. They were
Latino-Americans here, marking this moment when one of their own reached the
highest offices in the land. And while the partiers played inside, it's true
that a glance through the window told you that most everybody else outside
really had no idea what was going on upstairs, that this was a Latino thing.
This was a gathering of Latino lawyers and judges at the Puerto Rican Legal
Defense Fund in Manhattan where Sotomayor used to sit on the board.
LAURA VISITACION-LEWIS [Wearing a T-shirt that says "Wise Latina"]: We
feel that this is the way of showing that that remark was not one that should be
relegated to something that has to be disowned or has to mean something
negative. Our experiences can be richer simply because they're
different.
DONVAN: Laura Visitacion-Lewis is the only Latino woman on the New York State
Supreme Court in Manhattan.
VISITACION-LEWIS: She's a terrific role model and she has broken a stereotype
that many Latina judges have lived with for a long time.
DONVAN: And while this is definitely a Latino thing, it is also, we should
say, an American thing and here is why. Back to that view out the window, and
it's a fair bet, that, at some point, most of America's non-Latino passerby also
had a moment like today’s. Call it a Jackie Robinson moment, to borrow a lesson
from sports. And from the man whose break through into the majors was good
for all of us, but the warm feeling inside, the one that gets you right there,
really belonged to those who could say he is one of our own.
PRESIDENT JOHN F. KENNEDY: Ask not what your country can do for you; ask what
you can do for your country.
DONVAN: And so it has been in politics. This was the Jackie Robinson moment
for America’s Catholics.
KENNEDY: So help me God.
DONVAN: JFK’s picture hung in millions of
Irish-Catholic homes. He was one of them. At other times, it's been Jewish
Americans. That a lawyer named Louis Brandeis was named to the Supreme Court a
nearly a century ago when most Jews couldn't break into most law firms, that was
a Jackie Robinson moment. Then there was Mike Dukakis who ran for President
in 1988 as the Democrat. Did anybody but Greek Americans know how much that
meant to Greek Americans? Today, we asked somebody who should know.
GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS (ABC News Chief Washington Correspondent): There was
something that trumps the politics, the partisanship. I knew a lot of Republican
Greeks who were supporting a Democrat for first time just because he was one of
them.
DONVAN: Then of course the biggest Jackie Robinson moment of them all,
election night 2008. Some African-American students watching the returns and
then it happened. And though it came 62 years after that break into the major
leagues, this moment also says something about America.
JOHN ROBERTS: So help you God?
BARACK OBAMA: So help me God.
DONVAN: Because he could not have made it without millions of white Americans
voting for him. Just as Kennedy couldn't without the votes of millions of
non-Catholics. And just as Sotomayor, today, wouldn't have been confirmed but
for the decision of the Senate chamber filled with mostly older, Caucasian men.
It was a Latino moment, yes, but an American one too. I'm John Donvan for
Nightline in Washington.
BASHIR: Congratulations to her.
—Scott Whitlock is a news analyst for the Media Research Center.