On September 6, U.S. Senator Roy Blunt (Mo.) spoke on the Senate floor to highlight his support for Judge Brett Kavanaugh’s nomination to serve on the Supreme Court.

Blunt said that Judge Kavanaugh’s record on the bench, which includes over 300 opinions, demonstrates a commitment to interpreting the law as it is written. Blunt also noted that the Supreme Court has endorsed Judge Kavanaugh’s opinions thirteen times during his 12 years on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals. In addition, Blunt highlighted Judge Kavanaugh’s unanimous well-qualified rating from the American Bar Association, which is its highest rating.

Following are Excerpts From Blunt’s Remarks:

“I want to speak for a few minutes about the hearings going on today with Judge Brett Kavanaugh. I had a chance, as you did, to meet him a little over a month ago. It was clear from that conversation that he is clearly the best person available, in my view, to fill the vacancy left by Justice Anthony Kennedy. His opening remarks this week, I think, gave great evidence to that. He said he described himself, quote, as a, he said ‘A judge must be an umpire, a neutral and impartial arbiter who favors no litigant or policy.’ He went on to say ‘I do not decide cases based on personal or policy preferences. I am not a pro-plaintiff or pro-defendant judge. I am not a pro-prosecution or pro-defense judge. I am a pro-law judge.’ …

“There’s a lot of discussion about, ‘Well, there’s not enough material out there. We haven’t seen everything. We haven’t seen everything that went through the White House when he was the Staff Secretary for President Bush,’ Bush 43, George W. Bush. … In fact, there’s more paperwork available to look at from Judge Kavanaugh than for the last five Supreme Court judges put together. If you’re looking for paper, you got paper. If you’re looking for a judge’s position, you have also got that. You’ve got 300 cases, some of which were appealed to the Supreme Court. Thirteen of his almost exact opinions, and I think some of them were when he was in the minority, on the Circuit Court bench, became the opinion that the Supreme Court essentially adopted almost exactly as Judge Kavanaugh had written it. …

“Why would the D.C. Circuit, that’s the court of appeals for the D.C. area, why would the D.C. Circuit be the second-most important court in the country? Because most of the cases that involve new federal law, that involve expansive federal law wind up right here. And Judge Kavanaugh for 12 years has been one of those judges, and believe me, if the Supreme Court had said over and over again, when there’s an appeal from the D.C. Circuit, Judge Kavanaugh’s opinion really makes no sense. Or Judge Kavanaugh’s opinion wasn’t based on the law, the facts, and the Constitution. We would have heard about that. Three hundred opinions, we would have heard about that, if that would have been the case, and we have not heard about that. In fact, what we’ve heard over and over again is the job that the judge has done and the skill he brings to the court.

“The judge’s job is to decide what the law says. If you look at every case before you, if you evaluate it based on the facts and apply the rule of law, you’re going to come up with a conclusion that you won’t always like, but you’ll come up with a conclusion that the people that are in this case will understand where you came up with it because you came up with it based on the law and the facts.  

“In addition to his legal career, he’s really devoted himself to his community. He works coaching his daughter’s basketball team with some pride. …  He’s a church volunteer, mentoring people at schools. He has been widely supported by those who have dealt with him, his classmates, his colleagues, his clerks, lawyers, legal scholars. This week, he unanimously received a well-qualified rating from the American Bar Association. This is the very highest rating they could give. It’s unanimous. That’s a pretty good signal that he must be well-prepared as a lawyer to be a judge. The Judiciary Committee has received letters from more than 140 law professors, more than 40 members of the Supreme Court Bar, 34 of his former law clerks, 80 former Harvard Law students, 31 governors, and many more. His nomination isn’t just widely supported, it’s thoroughly vetted – 480,000 pages of documents, 300 cases of opinions he has written. I continue to believe that the Supreme Court is one of the long-lasting and most important legacies of a president. But it’s also one of the important legacies of a Senate. … I think Judge Kavanaugh is going to serve our country well and, I hope, long, and look forward to his confirmation later this month.”