Kavanaugh, Gorsuch actually disagreed quite frequently during their first term on the bench together
Supreme Court Justices Brett Kavanaugh and Neil Gorsuch have a lot in common: They're both considered conservatives, they were both nominated for the Supreme Court by President Trump, and they even went to the same high school. But it turns out they don't agree when it comes to court decisions as often as expected, The Washington Post reports.
In fact, Kavanaugh and Gorsuch disagree much more frequently — in 30 percent of cases in their first term together — than any other pair of judges appointed by the same president in recent years, the Post reports. While that means they still agree 70 percent of the time, comparatively Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan, both selected by former President Obama, agreed on 96 percent of their cases in their first term. Former President George W. Bush's choices, Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito, synced up 92 percent of the time, and Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer, who both got the nod from former President Bill Clinton, only disagreed on 11 percent of their cases.
That doesn't mean that Kavanaugh and Gorsuch are ideological opposites. They still find common ground on major issues, such as gerrymandering, the death penalty, and religious interests, the Post reports, and they both appeared ready to approve the Trump administration's 2020 census citizenship question before Roberts stifled it. But, they've proven difficult to peg down.
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Gorsuch, in particular, looks like he's carving out his own path, Nicole Saharsky, a lawyer who frequently argues before the court, told the Post. Indeed, he was a frequent dissenter, landing in the minority on 25 percent of his term cases. Read more at The Washington Post.
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Tim is a staff writer at The Week and has contributed to Bedford and Bowery and The New York Transatlantic. He is a graduate of Occidental College and NYU's journalism school. Tim enjoys writing about baseball, Europe, and extinct megafauna. He lives in New York City.
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