President Donald Trump first tweeted Jan. 25 with a firm date of when he would unveil his Supreme Court pick. But as it turns out, Neil Gorsuch wasn’t even told that he was the eventual nominee until two days later.
New documents released by the Senate Judiciary Committee on Saturday reveal specifics about how the Tenth Circuit judge was selected as Trump’s nominee to replace the late Justice Antonin Scalia. The information was included in a 68-page nominee questionnaire required of all Supreme Court nominees that details Gorsuch’s legal background, biographical information and key cases in which he has been involved.
Gorsuch first had contact with Trump’s team on Dec. 2, 2016, when Leonard Leo, the executive vice president of the Federalist Society, reached out to him about the vacancy. Leo and the Federalist Society had been intimately involved in Trump’s search for the next Supreme Court justice.
The first official interview with someone on Trump’s staff was Jan. 5, when future White House counsel Don McGahn met with Gorsuch to discuss the vacancy. That same day, McGahn and Gorsuch also sat down with other major players at the White House: Vice President-elect Mike Pence, chief strategist Steve Bannon, future chief of staff Reince Priebus and Mark Paoletta, Pence’s chief counsel.
One day later, Gorsuch interviewed with Makan Delrahim, who is now deputy White House counsel.
Trump, accompanied by McGahn, interviewed Gorsuch in person on Jan. 14. The questionnaire doesn’t disclose where Trump had interviewed the judge, but transition pool reports from that day show Trump and McGahn were at Trump Tower in Manhattan. McGahn entered Trump Tower about 9:30 a.m. and left shortly before 1:30 p.m.
Less than two weeks later, on Jan. 27, McGahn called Gorsuch with the news: He would be the nominee.
Two days before that call, Trump had tweeted that he would reveal his pick for the Supreme Court the following week. Gorsuch again heard from Trump on Jan. 30 – the same day Trump wrote on Twitter that he had moved up his Supreme Court announcement by two days – and that the president would choose him as the nominee.
The official announcement from the East Room of the White House was Jan. 31.
Gorsuch also details the extent of his political involvement in the questionnaire. The nominee has never held any official role in a presidential campaign, but volunteered for Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush. He was also a member of a group called “Lawyers for Bush-Cheney.”
Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) noted that much of Gorsuch’s writings – whether legal opinions or academic papers – were already publicly available. The judge has written 240 opinions, including 175 in the majority, Grassley said, and has participated in roughly 2,700 cases.
“I appreciate Judge Gorsuch working diligently to return his questionnaire in a timely fashion. He’s gone to great lengths to produce the material requested by the Judiciary Committee,” Grassley said. “I look forward to reviewing the material and asking him questions when he appears before the committee.”
Grassley has said he expects to hold confirmation hearings in mid-March.