Amy Coney Barrett hearings: Nominee owns a gun, but says she would rule 'fairly' on gun control cases

Trump SCOTUS nominee says she can separate her personal beliefs from her legal decisions

US Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett has said her family owns a gun, but that would not prevent her from ruling “fairly” on any legal cases on gun control brought before her.

“Ah, we do own a gun,” Ms Barrett said in response to a question from Senate Judiciary Chairman Lindsey Graham on Tuesday.

Ms Barrett, who was selected by Donald Trump last month to replace the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, told the committee she has been able to separate her personal choices as an American from her legal decisions as a federal appeals court judge, a position she has held since her confirmation in 2017.

“I can, I have done that in my time on the 7th Circuit. If I stay on the 7th Circuit, I'll continue to do that. If I'm confirmed to the Supreme Court, I will do that still,” she said.

Ms Barrett also noted that justices cannot just rule on any issue they please.

While the Supreme Court has final authority on deciding which cases it hears, it cannot create its own pet projects to issue rulings on thorny political issues such as abortion, second amendment rights, and gay marriage. Those cases must wend their way up to the Supreme Court through the lower federal courts, Ms Barrett pointed out.

“Judges can’t just wake up one day and say, ‘I have an agenda. I like guns, I hate guns, I like abortion, I hate abortion,’ and walk in like a royal queen and impose their will on the world,” Ms Barrett said.

Throughout the morning, Ms Barrett parried away questions about how she would rule on certain cases, saying “the canons of judicial conduct would prohibit” her from expressing her views.

Democrats have been bent on portraying her as a menace to the 2010 health care law known as Obamacare, citing several of the judge’s past statements putting her at odds with the law, particularly the individual health insurance mandate.

When asked by California Democratic Senator Dianne Feinstein if she agreed with her mentor, the late Justice Antonin Scalia, that Roe v Wade was wrongly decided, Ms Barrett invoked liberal Justice Elena Kagan’s answers during her 2010 hearings that “the canons of judicial conduct would prohibit” her from expressing a view.

“If I express a view on a precedent one way or another … it signals to litigants that I may tilt one way or another on a pending case,” Ms Barrett said. “I can’t pre-commit and say, yes, I’m going in with some agenda.”

Ms Barrett added:  “I don’t have any agenda.”