Sotomayor 'Tough as Nails': Brother

Says she burst into tears when Obama gave her the news

(NEWSER) - Sonia Sotomayor sat by the phone for 12 hours waiting for the call. When it finally rang, “I had my left hand over my chest, trying to calm my beating heart,” she recalls in an interview with C-SPAN. When President Obama offered her the Supreme Court appointment, “I caught my breath and started to cry and said, ‘Thank you, Mr. President.'” More»

Poll numbers plummeted amid Sotomayor, Gates controversies

(NEWSER) - President Obama’s downward opinion-poll trajectory among whites seems to be linked to the “blackening” of his image, writes Joan Walsh in Salon. It accelerated during two racially charged moments this summer: Sonia Sotomayor’s nomination to the Supreme Court, marked with debate over her “wise Latina” comment, and the Henry Louis Gates controversy. At such times, Walsh argues, “there's no denying, he got blacker to a segment of the white population.” More»

Republican embraces bipartisanship on Sotomayor nomination

(NEWSER) - Lindsey Graham’s been on the Republican hot seat since throwing his support behind Sonia Sotomayor, but he doesn’t think much of the purity police attacking him. “I have no desire to be up here in an irrelevant status,” the senior senator from South Carolina tells Politico. “If we chase this attitude that you have to say ‘no’ to every Democratic proposal … then I don’t want to be part of the movement, because it’s a dead-end movement.” More»

(NEWSER) - Robert Gibbs said today Sonia Sotomayor regrets the way she phrased 2001 comments that have some Republicans calling the Supreme Court nominee a racist, the Hill reports. “I think she'd say that her word choice was poor,” the White House press secretary said. He suggested that Sotomayor was not trying to say Latina women make better judges than white men, but that “your experiences impact your understanding.” More»

He also refers to the 'eight' Supreme Court justices

(NEWSER) - Ouch. Rick Perry gave an interview to the Des Moines Register today in which he criticized "activist judges" on the Supreme Court, but he suffered an awkward silence as he struggled to come up with the name of Sonia Sotomayor. In fact, the best he could do was "Montemayor" before a reporter helped him out. More»