By: Matthew Glowicki – courier-journal.com – July 10, 2018

He’s up for a seat on our highest court. Here’s what you need to know about Brett Kavanaugh. USA TODAY

Years before he worked in the chambers of U.S. Court of Appeals Judge Brett Kavanaugh in Washington, D.C., Justin Walker sat in his classroom.

Walker, now an assistant law professor at the University of Louisville, recalls how Kavanaugh left an impression and made the course in his second year at Harvard Law School his favorite.

On Monday evening, President Donald Trump named Kavanaugh, 53, as his pick to replace retiring Justice Anthony Kennedy on the U.S. Supreme Court.

“I think Judge Kavanaugh reveres the constitution,” Walker said. “He’s impeccably qualified. I think he’s going to be an independent thinker and a very fair-minded justice on the court.”

Walker worked as a clerk for Kavanaugh — widely considered to be the front-runner for the nomination — in 2010-2011 and soon after for Justice Kennedy.

“I think highly of both of them,” Walker said. “Kennedy taught me a lot about civility, about idealism, about kindness.”

Kavanaugh himself was a clerk under Kennedy, as was sitting Justice Neil Gorsuch, a Trump nominee.

“It’s also special to be succeeded by a former clerk,” Walker said. “I think it’s a special thing that speaks well of Justice Kennedy.”

Kavanaugh’s court has also sent many clerks to the Supreme Court, some 41, according to USA Today, far more than any of his competitors for the nomination.

The Senate will need to confirm Kavanaugh before he joins the Supreme Court. The new member the court could move it in a more conservative direction for decades.

Leonard Leo, while on leave as executive vice president of the Federalist Society, advised the White House on the high court nomination.

The Federalist Society, an influential organization of conservatives and libertarians, holds among its beliefs that the duty of the judiciary is to say what the law is, not what it should be.

Walker, who was on the executive board of the Harvard Federalist Society, said Kavanaugh has a reverence for the law.

“He takes very seriously the limits of the judiciary,” Walker said. “He believes it’s not the job of a judge to invent new law.”

Walker, who before joining U of L was worked in a Washington, D.C., law firm and as a speechwriter for former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, said he believes Kavanaugh will be an independent thinker and open-minded.

“He’ll care about what the text of the law requires a judge to do,” he said. “He will not care about partisan political issues and outcomes.”

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Source: Louisville professor worked under Judge Brett Kavanaugh