Justice Sonia Sotomayor says SCOTUS 'lost our only civil rights lawyer' when RBG died (perhaps she should have a word with Clarence Thomas)

Sarah D | 2:11 PM on October 14, 2021

Justice Sonia Sotomayor recently offered some insight into how things work in SCOTUSLand:

Justice Sonia Sotomayor told an audience Wednesday that recent changes in the format of oral arguments were instituted in part after studies emerged showing that female justices on the court were interrupted more by male justices and advocates.

Or perhaps censored by ostensibly professional female journalists. But we digress.

Sotomayor also had this to say:

Sotomayor also echoed President Joe Biden’s criticisms about the current court’s lack of professional diversity. She noted that when Ruth Bader Ginsburg passed, “we lost our only civil rights lawyer” and that currently there is no other justice who has “been in the trenches” on civil rights, or immigration, or environmental law.

“I do worry that the authorities who are selecting judges are not paying enough attention to that kind of diversity as well,” Sotomayor said. She said that she works to hire law clerks with diverse backgrounds and selects her audiences carefully to spread her message.

Justice Sotomayor laments the loss of RBG, “the court’s only civil rights lawyer.”

She forgot Justice Thomas, who spent eight years heading the EEOC, the largest civil right organization in the country. /1https://t.co/DFTFKbmQ8T pic.twitter.com/I4ry9L21Om

— Carrie Severino (@JCNSeverino) October 14, 2021