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In the midst of the GOP debate hullabaloo Saturday night, Donald Trump dropped the name of Wisconsin’s own Diane Sykes for the Supreme Court of the United States.
This was a smart move for Trump – although I have no idea what to make of the rest of the GOP debate Saturday night. Literally, I am speechless. My 10-year-old daughter caught a bit of Trump hectoring Ted Cruz and said, "Trump sucks. He’s rude." My 10-year-old! Trump trashed George W. Bush and claimed Jeb Bush had talked about mooning someone. Yet some of the cable pundits were saying Trump won it and was dominant. Who knows?
The Sykes’ mention, though, was shrewd.
The tragic and shocking death of conservative stalwart Antonin Scalia threatened to disrupt the Trump-mentum, much as the Paris attacks turned people away from Ben Carson. Universally, people started to wonder: Who would a President Trump appoint to the SCOTUS? Be honest. Who knows?
At least until Saturday night.
Trump was just as capable of appointing Kanye West as a brilliant conservative jurist like ... Diane Sykes. Sykes is more than acceptable to conservatives. She’s unassailable on the right, really.
So it was smart of Trump to offer up a specific name to negate such murmuring. It seems unlikely President Obama could get a nominee through the Republican-controlled Senate in nine months.
Trump name dropped another federal judge’s name, too, Bill Pryor. But he dropped Sykes’ name again in post-debate comments to CNN. Before 9 p.m., he also posted on Facebook about Sykes and Pryor.
Diane S. Sykes and William H. Pryor Jr. would make excellent nominees to replace beloved Justice Scalia when I become president. #GOPDebate Posted by Donald J. Trump on Saturday, February 13, 2016
Before her name ends up everywhere tomorrow, here are ten basic things to know about Diane Sykes, who is well-known in Wisconsin:
- She is a federal judge, serving on the Seventh Circuit of the U.S. Court of Appeals.
- She has a journalism degree!
- She served as a circuit judge in Milwaukee County.
- She was first appointed to the Wisconsin Supreme Court by Tommy Thompson, and was then elected to it, replacing Louis Butler. Butler was then appointed to the Supreme Court and lost re-election.
- She was nominated to the Seventh Circuit by George W. Bush.
- She was confirmed to the federal bench on a 70-27 vote the U.S. Senate in 2004.
- She’s 58 years old.
- She’s the ex-wife of prominent Milwaukee conservative talk show host Charlie Sykes.
- She received her law degree from Marquette University Law School in 1984.
- She is a member of the Federalist Society and was mentioned as a possible long-shot SCOTUS choice during the Bush presidency.
Jessica McBride spent a decade as an investigative, crime, and general assignment reporter for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and is a former City Hall reporter/current columnist for the Waukesha Freeman.
She is the recipient of national and state journalism awards in topics that include short feature writing, investigative journalism, spot news reporting, magazine writing, blogging, web journalism, column writing, and background/interpretive reporting. McBride, a senior journalism lecturer at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, has taught journalism courses since 2000.
Her journalistic and opinion work has also appeared in broadcast, newspaper, magazine, and online formats, including Patch.com, Milwaukee Magazine, Wisconsin Public Radio, El Conquistador Latino newspaper, Investigation Discovery Channel, History Channel, WMCS 1290 AM, WTMJ 620 AM, and Wispolitics.com. She is the recipient of the 2008 UWM Alumni Foundation teaching excellence award for academic staff for her work in media diversity and innovative media formats and is the co-founder of Media Milwaukee.com, the UWM journalism department's award-winning online news site. McBride comes from a long-time Milwaukee journalism family. Her grandparents, Raymond and Marian McBride, were reporters for the Milwaukee Journal and Milwaukee Sentinel.
Her opinions reflect her own not the institution where she works.
