John Cornyn
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John Cornyn III (born February 2, 1952) is the junior United States Senator from Texas. He was elected to his first term in 2002. He is a Republican. His Democratic Party opponent was former Dallas, Texas, mayor Ron Kirk. He is married to Sandy Cornyn, with whom he has two daughters, Danley and Haley. He attends University Avenue Church of Christ in Austin.
He graduated from Trinity University in 1973, where he majored in journalism and was a member of the local fraternity Chi Delta Tau. [link] [link] [link]
Cornyn later earned his J.D. from St. Mary's University School of Law in 1977, as well as an LL.M. from the University of Virginia School of Law in 1995 . [link] [link]
After serving six years as a District Court Judge in San Antonio, Texas, he was elected to the Texas Supreme Court in 1990 and re-elected in 1996. Cornyn resigned from the Texas Supreme Court in 1997 to run for the office of attorney general of Texas. When elected, he became the first Republican to win the position since Reconstruction. He left that post for his successful Senate run.
In 2005 Cornyn's name was floated among possibilities to replace Supreme Court justices Sandra Day O'Connor or William Rehnquist.
Senate Career
Cornyn, widely considered to be a very close Senate ally for the current President Bush, sits on the U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary as chairman of the Judiciary Subcommittee on Immigration. He previously served as chairman of the Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Property Rights. He also serves on the Armed Services Committee, the Budget Committee, the Small Business and Entrepreneurship Committee, and the Joint Economic Committee. In 2004, Cornyn [co-founded and became the co-chairman] of the [U.S. Senate India Caucus] with the encouragement and aid of the [USINPAC] Political Action Committee.
In June 2004 the following [remarks] on same-sex marriage were widely attributed to the senator and often used as a source of ridicule on such programs as The Daily Show.
- "It does not affect your daily life very much if your neighbor marries a box turtle. But that does not mean it is right. ... Now you must raise your children up in a world where that union of man and box turtle is on the same legal footing as man and wife."
In June 2005, Cornyn stirred controversy when he was one of 17 senators to decline to co-sponsor a [Senate resolution] apologizing for not passing anti-lynching legislation. Supporters point out that Cornyn rarely co-sponsors matters before the full Senate. They emphasize that although Cornyn did not cosponsor this particular resolution, he also did not oppose it; the resolution was approved by unanimous consent, meaning that no senator, including Cornyn, raised an objection to its passage.
In September 2005, during the Supreme Court hearings for John G. Roberts Jr., Cornyn's staff passed out bingo cards to reporters, asking them to stamp their card every time a Democrat on the Judiciary Committee used terms such as "far right" or "extremist". [link]
After the withdrawal of the nomination of Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court, Cornyn was mentioned as a possible replacement nominee.
In September 2005, Cornyn sponsored a bill that would allow law enforcement to force anyone arrested or detained to provide samples of their DNA, which would be recorded in a central database. [link]
During senate hearings on a possible censure of President George W. Bush Cornyn attacked Russ Feingold and argued that censuring the president would amount to "aiding our enemies during a time of war".
A recent SurveyUSA poll shows Cornyn is one of the least popular members of the Senate, with only a 43% approval rating and a 47% disapproval, which stands in contrast to fellow Texas Republican senator Kay Bailey Hutchison's 58% approval rating.[link]
Court violence controversy
Cornyn has been active in criticizing what he calls "activist judges". Cornyn caused a controversy in the wake of several high-profile violent crimes and death threats against judges when he stated on the floor of the U.S. Senate on April 4, 2005, that "raw political or ideological decisions" by judges cause "great distress" in many people and wondered aloud if this "distress" was the cause of the violence.
- I don't know if there is a cause-and-effect connection but we have seen some recent episodes of courthouse violence in this country. Certainly nothing new, but we seem to have run through a spate of courthouse violence recently that's been on the news and I wonder whether there may be some connection between the perception in some quarters on some occasions where judges are making political decisions yet are unaccountable to the public, that it builds up and builds up and builds up to the point where some people engage in - engage in violence.[link]
Cornyn argued that his remarks were taken out of context. [link] -- that as a former judge himself, he was "outraged" by recent acts of violence against judges. The following day on the Senate floor he said:
- there is no possible justification for courthouse violence. ... I am not aware of any evidence whatsoever linking recent acts of courthouse violence to the various controversial rulings that have captured the Nation's attention in recent years.
- My point was, and is, simply this: We should all be concerned that the judiciary is losing respect that it needs to serve the interests of the American people well. We should all want judges who interpret the law fairly -- not impose their own personal views on the Nation. We should all want to fix our broken judicial confirmation process. And we should all be disturbed by overheated rhetoric about the judiciary from both sides of the aisle. I regret that my remarks have been taken out of context to create a wrong impression about my position, and possibly be construed to contribute to the problem rather than to a solution. Our judiciary must not be politicized. Rhetoric about the judiciary and about judicial nominees must be toned down. Our broken judicial confirmation process must be fixed once and for all. [link]
On March 9, 2006, retired Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor gave a speech in which she said of Cornyn: "It doesn't help when a high-profile senator suggests there may be a connection between violence against judges and decisions that the senator disagrees with." [link]
Casino investigation
On April 18, 2005, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) filed Texas Public Information Act requests with both the Texas Office of the Attorney General and with the Texas Governor's Office to obtain information regarding contacts between Cornyn and lobbyist Jack Abramoff and his partner Michael Scanlon and former Christian Coalition leader Ralph Reed, as well as for all documents related to the Tigua Tribe of El Paso, Texas.CREW filed its requests in response to Sen. Cornyn's statement that he never met with Reed in regard to the Tigua casino. (Maria Recio, Fort Worth Star-Telegram) However, some believe email correspondence between Abramoff and Reed suggests otherwise.
On November 12, 2001, Reed sent Abramoff an e-mail message stating, "get me details so I can alert cornyn and let him know what we are doing to help him" [sic]. Similarly, on November 13, 2001, Reed wrote "I strongly suggest we start doing patch-throughs to perry and cornyn [sic]. We're getting killed on the phone." Also, on January 7, 2002, Reed sent Abramoff an e-mail stating "I think we should budget for an ataboy for cornyn" [sic].
When Cornyn ran for Senate, Abramoff contributed $1,000. The allegedly anti-gambling Cornyn also received $6,250 in contributions from Las Vegas casino interests who oppose Indian gaming, some of which were made at the same time Cornyn was pushing to close the Tigua's casino.
External links
- [U.S. Senate: John Cornyn]
- [Courthouse violence remarks]
- [Retraction/clarification of courthouse violence remarks]
- [opensecrets.org: 2004 PAC contributions to John Cornyn]
- [Citizens for Ethics FOIA Request]
- [Courts are to blame for war on Christmas] see also War on Christmas
- [record maintained by the Washington Post]
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