Jones Has Bipartisan Edge If Biden Picks Him as Attorney General

(Bloomberg) -- Democratic Senator Doug Jones’s potential selection as Joe Biden’s attorney general could lead to a relatively easy confirmation with bipartisan support — a rarity these days for a job that has become a nexus of intensely partisan fights.

Jones, a former U.S. attorney, won a special election in 2017 but was defeated in November in deeply Republican Alabama. But he built bipartisan friendships in those three years -- Republican Senator Richard Shelby lauded his service after Jones gave his farewell address Wednesday — and he has been touted for the attorney general job by top Democrats and Biden allies, including House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn and House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer.

Jones, 66, has long been a Biden ally himself — endorsing him early — and they’ve known each other for decades.

Any Democrat -- including Jones -- will face tough questions in a confirmation, given that the hearings will come as Biden’s son Hunter is facing a federal investigation into his finances and Republicans are seeking to shelter the special counsel investigation into the origins of the Trump-Russia probe.

But other possible Biden picks for the job, like former Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates, would have an even tougher time. President Donald Trump fired her when she refused to go along with the Muslim travel ban and earlier this year, she testified about her involvement in the various Russia probes before the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Former Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick and Circuit Court Judge Merrick Garland have also been discussed in the Biden camp.

Clyburn talked up Jones in an interview with the website Cheddar Wednesday, praising his role prosecuting two former Ku Klux Klan members for the 1963 bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama.

“Decades they walked around free after bombing that church and killing those four Black girls. He prosecuted them and got them convicted,” Clyburn said about Jones. “You don’t have to be Black to do right by Black people.”

Clyburn, who criticized Biden early in the transition for not choosing more African Americans for top cabinet jobs, said the job doesn’t need to go to someone of color.

“What’s required is for someone who understands what it is to have a judicial system that works for everybody,” he said.

Hoyer called Jones “extraordinary.”

Bipartisan plaudits

Senior senators in both parties praised Jones after his farewell address Wednesday, auguring well for a quick confirmation if he were selected.

Shelby, the chairman of the Appropriations Committee and the senior Alabama senator, noted on the Senate floor that he supported Jones’ nomination by President Bill Clinton to be U.S. attorney, and lauded his tenure there too.

“We worked hand in glove. We have become friends. We have our differences, but we also have a lot of things that he talked about today where we would come together for the state and for the country,” Shelby said. “I think we will hear more from him in the weeks ahead, in the months ahead. I certainly hope so. He has a lot to give.”

Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois, who is in line to become the top Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, which would hold the first confirmation hearings for attorney general, also lauded Jones. He said he had repeatedly shown courage in the Senate, including speaking out against gun violence, despite potential criticism from his conservative constituents, and in backing a policing overhaul with senators Kamala Harris and Cory Booker.

Biden has supported Jones before, campaigning for him when he ran to replace Republican Senator Jeff Sessions, who resigned to become Trump’s first attorney general.

Jones told the Montgomery Advertiser last month that Biden called him on election night, and said he planned to support Biden “in any way I can” amid speculation he’d be in Biden’s cabinet.

Jones told the newspaper he first met Biden more than 40 years ago when the now president-elect came to visit the Cumberland School of Law where Jones was a student, and later as a Senate staffer. Jones served as Alabama co-chair for Biden’s unsuccessful campaign for president in 1987.

Jones usually voted with his party at major moments, including to convict Trump in his impeachment trial for both abuse of power and obstruction of Congress, despite Trump’s strong support in Alabama.

Jones’s experience also aligns with Biden’s priorities for the Justice Department. That includes reinvigorating efforts to combat domestic terrorist threats, primarily from White supremacy groups, according to a person familiar with the thinking within Biden’s transition team. Jones helped prosecute Eric Rudolph for carrying out anti-abortion and anti-gay bombings from 1996 to 1998, including the 1996 Atlanta Olympics attack.

But Jones touted his bipartisan friendships Wednesday in his farewell speech, including those with Republicans Ted Cruz and Susan Collins, and cited fictional attorney Atticus Finch, the hero in the novel “To Kill a Mockingbird,” as an example of someone who could restore people’s faith in government.

“It is possible for each of us to learn -- as Atticus Finch taught us -- to see things from another person’s point of view, to walk around in their skin or in their shoes,” Jones said.

The Justice Department has been buffeted in recent years by Trump’s attempts to politicize it. Jones was one of just three Democrats to vote for Attorney General William Barr’s confirmation, but tweeted in 2019 that “with the benefit of hindsight” he would have voted differently.

Biden has said he won’t interfere in the operations of the Justice Department in his administration.

©2020 Bloomberg L.P.