The Borking Rebellion
Last updated October 31, 2026
By Jeffrey Lord
Jeffrey Lord, a former political director in the Reagan White House, tells how a bipartisan group of Pittsburgh lawyers, many of them women, fought for the 2002 confirmation of Judge D. Brooks Smith to the Third Circuit Court of Appeals. Lord, a college friend of Smith who helped organize the campaign, uses the story to show how "borking," named for the 1987 defeat of Robert Bork, spread to lower-court nominations, and how citizens can push back.
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