Obama Supreme Court Nominee – Elena Kagan

President Obama will announce this morning that he has settled on his solicitor general, Elena Kagan, to be his nominee to replace Justice John Paul Stevens on the U.S. Supreme Court, a knowledgeable source told the Chicago Sun-Times.

Both Obama and Kagen taught at the University of Chicago together. Stevens was an undergraduate at the school. The former Harvard Law School dean clerked for former Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall and former federal Appellate Judge Abner Mikva, an Obama confidant who has talked up Kagan for the Supreme Court since Obama took office.

The selection of Kagan was the result of an overall strategy mapped by White House chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, with the work of whittling down the nominee list handled by White House Counsel Bob Bauer.

Kagan may be considered one of the safest bets for Obama because she has not worked as a judge and so has not authored any controversial opinions. Some conservatives are expected to criticize her for Harvard Law School’s barring of military recruiters on campus when she was dean there because of the military’s don’t-ask, don’t-tell policy on gays.

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