“Wise Latinas” Make Better Judges: Sonia Sotomayor Meant What She Said

Conn Carroll / June 05, 2009

Last Friday White House press secretary Robert Gibbs tried to defuse the controversy over Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor’s “wise Latina” comment claiming: “I think she’d say that her word choice in 2001 was poor, that she was simply making the point that personal experience are relevant for the process of the judging.” President Barack Obama himself later said: “I’m sure she would have restated it.”

But new documents now reveal that, far from a poor word choice, Sotomayor’s “women make better judges” claim was a common refrain in her stump speech. In the 2001 speech that first caused waves, Sotomayor said: (more…)