The civil rights case that haunts Donald Trump’s pick for attorney general

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The career of Jeff Sessions, President-elect Donald Trump's nominee for attorney general, has been shadowed by his prosecution of the "Marion Three." Sessions brought forth the voter fraud case as a U.S. attorney in 1985, and his critics alleged the charges to be racially motivated. The career of Jeff Sessions, President-elect Donald Trump's nominee for attorney general, has been shadowed by his prosecution of the "Marion Three." (Video: Dalton Bennett/Photo: Dalton Bennett/The Washington Post)

Coretta Scott King, the widow of civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr., urged Congress in a letter to block the 1986 nomination of Jeff Sessions for federal judge, saying that allowing him to join the federal bench would “irreparably damage the work of my husband.” The letter, previously unavailable publicly, was obtained on Tuesday by The Washington Post.

(Read the full letter below)

“Anyone who has used the power of his office as United States Attorney to intimidate and chill the free exercise of the ballot by citizens should not be elevated to our courts,” King wrote in the cover page of her nine-page letter opposing Sessions’s nomination, which failed. “Mr. Sessions has used the awesome powers of his office in a shabby attempt to intimidate and frighten elderly black voters. For this reprehensible conduct, he should not be rewarded with a federal judgeship.”

Thirty years later, Sessions, now a senator, is again undergoing confirmation hearings as President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee for attorney general, and he is facing fierce opposition from civil rights groups.

In the letter, King writes that Sessions’s ascension to the federal bench “simply cannot be allowed to happen,” arguing that as a U.S. attorney, the Alabama lawmaker pursued “politically-motivated voting fraud prosecutions” and that he “lacks the temperament, fairness and judgment to be a federal judge.” She said Sessions’s conduct in prosecuting civil rights leaders in a voting-fraud case “raises serious questions about his commitment to the protection of the voting rights of all American citizens.”

“The irony of Mr. Sessions’ nomination is that, if confirmed, he will be given a life tenure for doing with a federal prosecution what the local sheriffs accomplished twenty years ago with clubs and cattle prods,” she wrote, later adding, “I believe his confirmation would have a devastating effect on not only the judicial system in Alabama, but also on the progress we have made toward fulfilling my husband’s dream.”

During the 1986 hearing, the letter and King’s opposition became a crucial part of the argument against Sessions’s confirmation.

Sen. Warren reads Coretta Scott King's letter about Jeff Sessions outside the Senate

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After Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) struck down Sen. Elizabeth Warren's (D-Mass.) attempt to read a letter from Coretta Scott King on the floor of the Senate during the debate on attorney general nominee Jeff Sessions, Warren read the letter outside the doors of the Senate and streamed it live. After senate Republicans struck down an attempt to read Coretta Scott King's letter on Sessions on the floor, Sen. Warren read the letter outside the Senate. (Facebook/Sen. Elizabeth Warren)

BuzzFeed News first reported the existence of the letter earlier Tuesday, noting that it was never entered into the congressional record by then-Judiciary Committee Chair Strom Thurmond.

The full letter (Mobile users read here: https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3259988-Scott-King-1986-Letter-and-Testimony-Signed.html#document/p1):

Coretta Scott King's 1986 statement and testimony on Jeff Sessions's U.S. District Court nomination in Alabama
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Coretta Scott King's 1986 statement and testimony on Jeff Sessions's U.S. District Court nomination in Alabama
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Contributed by: Allison Michaels, Washington Post
To print the document, click the "Original Document" link to open the original PDF. At this time it is not possible to print the document with annotations.

This post will be updated.