Bush mulling new nominee

WASHINGTON — President Bush is mulling a short list of prospective Supreme Court nominees this weekend at the Camp David presidential retreat.

Liberals fear Bush will nominate someone to please the GOP's right flank, which opposed the failed nomination of Harriet Miers. Conservatives expect Bush to choose someone with a stellar legal background, judicial experience and a public record of opinions.

For three weeks, conservative Republicans criticized Miers, saying the Texas lawyer and loyal Bush confidante had thin credentials on constitutional law and no proven record as a judicial conservative.

"Interest groups are not entitled to an extraconstitutional veto over Supreme Court appointments," Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., and Vermont Sen. Patrick Leahy, the ranking Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, argued in a letter they sent to Bush on Friday.

"We strongly urge you to refrain from nominating to the Supreme Court any of the handful of judicial nominees who were filibustered during the past four years, or any other similarly divisive candidate," the Democrats wrote.

Topping conservatives' list of favorites are federal appellate judges Samuel Alito, J. Michael Luttig, Alice Batchelder, Priscilla Owen, Michael McConnell, Karen Williams and Janice Rogers Brown as well as Michigan Supreme Court Justice Maura Corrigan.

Other potential candidates who are not judges include Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas; Chris Cox, a former congressman and current chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission; and Maureen Mahoney, a frequent litigator before the high court. She sometimes is referred to as the "female version" of John Roberts, Bush's choice for chief justice, who was confirmed by the Senate 78-22.

"The president will probably just stick with the formula that has served him so well over five years of judicial selections, including the choice of Chief Justice John Roberts," said Wendy Long, counsel for the conservative Judicial Confirmation Network. "That is to pick a nominee with sterling legal credentials, weighty judicial experience and a transparent public record."

On Friday, the focus of the White House was on the indictment of Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, in the CIA leak investigation. Eager to put the investigation behind him, Bush said he looks forward to working with Congress to keep the economy moving "and pretty soon, I'll be naming someone to the Supreme Court."

Miers, the White House counsel, and Andy Card, White House chief of staff, climbed aboard Marine One with Bush.