Anti-Choice Judges
Susan Collins has played a key role in enabling the Trump administration’s crusade against women’s reproductive rights.
Collins frequently touts her pro-choice beliefs, but in reality, she’s voted to confirm at least 32 anti-choice judges to lifelong federal judicial appointments.
Here are some of the worst judicial nominees confirmed by Susan Collins.
Kenneth Bell
In May 2019, Collins voted to confirm Kenneth Bell to be a U.S. District Judge for the Western District of North Carolina. According to NARAL, Bell authored an op-ed that said, “Either the unborn is a mass of cells worth of no more consideration than a hangnail, or it is a child, which may not be killed. There is no middle ground.”
Carl Nichols
In May 2019, Collins voted to confirm Carl Nichols to be a U.S. District Judge for the District Of Columbia. According to NARAL, Nichols represented a pharmacy in its challenge to an Illinois rule that stopped pharmacies from refusing to fill women’s prescriptions for birth control, arguing that pharmacists who personally oppose emergency contraception should be able to refuse women their prescriptions.
Stephen Clark
In May 2019, Collins voted to confirm Stephen Clark to be a U.S. District Judge for the District of Missouri. According to NARAL, Clark submitted a legal brief on behalf of anti-choice organizations opposing the ACA’s contraceptive coverage policy. In the brief, Clark echoes a false conspiracy theory that claims birth control causes cancer and other health risks. He inaccurately claims that the contraceptive coverage policy “works directly against women’s health,” and “coerc[es] religiously objecting employers to cover drugs that significantly increase risks to women’s health.”
Michael J. Truncale
In May 2019, Collins voted to confirm Michael J. Truncale to be a U.S. District Judge for the Eastern District of Texas. During his 2012 campaign for Congress, Truncale billed himself as “strong pro-life and pro-family values,” and bragged “I was the only congressional candidate to participate in a recent March for Life, ecumenical March for Life.”
Andrew Lynn Brasher
In May 2019, Collins voted to confirm Andrew Lynn Brasher to be a U.S. District Judge for the middle district of Alabama. According to NARAL, Brasher defended an Alabama law that effectively puts young women seeking abortion care on trial by allowing a judge to appoint an attorney for the fetus and the district attorney to call witnesses to testify regarding the young woman’s maturity.
Brasher has also argued against the ACA’s contraceptive coverage policy; defended an Alabama law that prohibited the state from licensing an abortion clinic within 2,000 feet of a school; and defending an unconstitutional Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers (TRAP) law subjecting abortion providers to burdensome restrictions.
J. Campbell Barker
Patrick Wyrick
In April 2019, Collins voted to confirm Patrick Wyrick to be a U.S. District Judge for the Western District of Oklahoma. According to NARAL, Wyrick defended Oklahoma laws that forced doctors to use outdated, less safe, and less effective abortion care and required women seeking abortions to undergo ultrasounds.
Mark Norris
In October 2018, Collins voted to confirm Mark Norris to be a U.S. District Judge for the Western District of Tennessee. As a member of Tennessee’s state legislature, Norris voted for restrictions on abortion providers and personhood bills. He supported a resolution urging Congress to overturn the ACA’s contraceptive coverage policy that called the policy a “direct assault on people of faith and the very Constitution itself.”
Neomi Rao
In March 2019, Collins voted to confirm Neomi Rao to be a U.S. Circuit Judge for the D.C. Circuit. As Trump’s Administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, Rao oversaw numerous anti-choice regulations, including rules limiting the availability of contraceptive services if an employer objects, the proposed Title X domestic gag rule, and a rule that gives health care workers the right to discriminate against patients seeking reproductive care.
Daniel Collins
In May 2019, Susan Collins voted to confirm Daniel Collins to be a judge on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. According to NARAL, Daniel Collins authored an amicus brief on behalf of the anti-choice Ethics and Public Policy Center in Hobby Lobby Stores v. Sebelius, arguing against the ACA’s contraceptive-coverage policy. Daniel Collins also filed a judicial brief in defense of a crisis pregnancy center’s challenge to a local ordinance requiring them to disclose that they do not provide contraception or abortion services, arguing the ordinance “would burden the Center’s pro-life advocacy.”
Michael H. Park
In May 2019, Collins voted to confirm Michael H. Park to be a U.S. Circuit Judge for the Second Circuit. Park represented Kansas in a lawsuit attempting to defund Planned Parenthood, and defended the Trump administration’s efforts to block undocumented women from accessing abortion services.
Eric Miller
In February 2019, Collins voted to confirm Eric Miller to be a judge on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. A former clerk for anti-choice Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, Miller filed a brief in support of an Ohio law that banned a safe abortion procedure, and argued against military insurance covering abortion.
Jonathan A. Kobes
In December 2018, Collins voted to confirm Jonathan A. Kobes to be a judge on the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals. Kobes received a rare “not qualified” rating from the American Bar Association. Kobes is a former board member of Bethany Christian Services, a crisis pregnancy center that has helped facilitate the Trump administration’s family separation policy.
David Porter
In October 2018, Collins voted to confirm David Porter to be a U.S. Circuit Judge for the Third Circuit. Porter allied himself with anti-choice activists in the Pennsylvania Judicial Network to oppose the Supreme Court nomination of Sonia Sotomayor, and has contributed to far-right, anti-choice think tank the Center for Vision and Values.
Britt Grant
David Stras
In January 2018, Collins voted to confirm David Stras to be a judge on the Eighth Circuit. Stras opposed a ruling that agreed expert witnesses on the behavior of victims could testify in sexual assault cases.
Leonard Grasz
In December 2017, Collins voted to confirm Leonard Grasz to be a Judge on the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals. Grasz was rated “not qualified” by the American Bar Association. He once argued that abortion “borders on infanticide,” and that abortion providers must prove that they had a “constitutional right to kill a partially born human being.”
Gregory Katsas
In November 2017, Collins voted to confirm Gregory Katsas to be a U.S. Circuit Judge for the D.C. Circuit. As Deputy Assistant Attorney General, Katsas defended a late term abortion law, arguing the medical evidence was divided.
Allison Eid
In November 2017, Collins voted to confirm Allison Eid to be a judge on the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals. Eid “earned a reputation as one of [the Colorado Supreme Court’s] most conservative members,” adhering to a “rigid, ultraconservative partisan ideology.” In 2013, Eid voted to review an injunction by a lower court blocking the display of graphic anti-abortion images where children were reasonably likely to see them.
Joan Larsen
In November 2017, Collins voted to confirm Joan Larsen to be a judge on the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals. Larsen authored an article in the Ohio State Law Journal in which she argued against abortion based on the anti-choice laws of other countries.
Brett Kavanaugh
In October 2018, Collins voted to confirm Brett Kavanaugh as an Associate Justice to the U.S. Supreme Court. Kavanaugh was touted by the anti-choice Faith and Freedom Coalition as a “strong voice” to overturn Roe v. Wade. Kavanaugh applauded Justice Rehnquist’s dissent in Roe v. Wade as “stemming the general tide of freewheeling judicial creation of unenumerated rights that were not rooted in the nation’s history and tradition.”
Neil Gorsuch
In April 2017, Collins voted to confirm Neil Gorsuch to be an Associate Justice to the U.S. Supreme Court. Gorsuch supported the plaintiffs in the Hobby Lobby case, arguing that the Free Exercise Clause afforded religious employers and organizations an exemption from the ACA’s contraception mandate. Gorsuch also ruled that Utah could legally block Planned Parenthood funding after the doctored videos discussing the selling of fetal tissue were released.