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Kagan Witness List Features Activists, Military Brass

The Senate Judiciary Committee on Friday released the witness list for Elena Kagan’s Supreme Court confirmation hearings, one of which features numerous conservative activists and former military personnel.

The list of GOP witnesses appears aimed at trying to uncover what Republicans argue is Kagan’s liberal background and to help fuel questions about her decision to limit military recruiters’ access to Harvard Law School while she was dean.

Although most of his colleagues who met with Kagan have dismissed concerns about the military recruiter issue, Judiciary ranking member Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) has made it a central point of his attacks on the current solicitor general. Included on his list of witnesses are retired Army Lt. Gen. William “Jerry” Boykin, Army National Guard Capt. Pete Hegseth, retired Air Force Col. Thomas N. Moe and Army Capt. Flagg Youngblood.

Sessions has also included a number of high-profile conservative leaders, including Family Research Council President Tony Perkins, Americans United for Life President Charmaine Yoest and Ed Whelan, president of the Ethics and Public Policy Center.

Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) is bringing in Kurt White, president of the Harvard Law Armed Forces Association. Democrats have also asked Lilly Ledbetter to testify. Ledbetter was at the center of a discrimination case thrown out by the Supreme Court, which Democrats have tried to use to demonstrate the conservative bent of the current court.

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