Biden Judicial Nominee Said Criminal Justice System Rooted in ‘Racial Animus’

President Biden’s nominee for the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York has argued that the criminal justice system is rooted in “racial animus” passed down from “apartheid” America.

Biden announced Nusrat Choudhury’s nomination along with seven other federal judicial nominees in January, aiming to fulfill a “promise to ensure that the nation’s courts reflect the diversity that is one of our greatest assets as a country,” the White House said at the time.

Choudhury, an ACLU lawyer, has routinely talked about systemic racism in the criminal justice system. During a 2018 event at the University of Chicago Harris School of Public Policy, she argued the system is “premised on structural inequality.”

“A lot of the racial animus that undergirded apartheid in America was shifted into the criminal justice system,” she said, citing arguments made by “The New Jim Crow” author Michelle Alexander. “So the criminal justice system started doing the work of apartheid, which was criminalizing low-income Black and Latino people and keeping them down.”

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During a May 2021 panel with WTTW Chicago, Choudhury said, “It’s important to recognize that the roots of policing systems are actually grounded in slavery and segregation and upholding institutions of racial insubordination.”

During a 2021 ACLU virtual lunch, Choudhury said, “Policing and race are entwined.”

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