Over the past few years, we have been proud to stand shoulder to shoulder with Citizens for Judicial Fairness to advocate on behalf of the countless concerned but voiceless Delawareans, who want to bring equity and diversity to the beleaguered Delaware Chancery Court. 

When a vacancy first opened up on the Chancery Court earlier this year as Vice Chancellor Slights announced his retirement, we were cautiously hopeful that our voices would be heard by Gov. John Carney and he would finally do what’s right by nominating a justice of color to the critical seat, however what little hope we had has been quickly dashed.  

Instead, last week, Carney nominated Nathan Cook — who hails from a law firm made up entirely of white men in partnership positions — to the Chancery Court, an insult to the countless Delawareans who have been crying out for reform.

Cook’s appointment is an egregious affront to the action my friends and neighbors have worked tirelessly for; to ensure our children see their faces represented in our state’s highest court. No man who hails from a law firm made up entirely of white male partners can possibly understand what it is like to grow up black or brown in our state. To continue to turn a blind eye to the harm that occurs when courts don’t look like the people they represent would be a massive disservice to the future of Delaware and our nation. 

Unfortunately, while President Joe Biden, one of Delaware’s greatest sons, has led the way on judicial equity, his home state continues to fall tragically behind under the lacking leadership of Carney. 

We watched the president proudly as he nominated Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, a historic victory for our Supreme Court. Our nation knows his commitment goes beyond our nation’s highest court —nearly 70% of the President’s Circuit Court nominees are people of color, 78% are women and more than 40% have been Black women. Biden has put his money where his mouth is for our federal court system. 

We have never been blind to these injustices because we are forced to see these inequities in our everyday lives. We see them in a state where the prison population has increased by 275% since 1978 and yet in that same time no black man or woman has ever been allowed to decide a verdict in the judicial system that continued to lock them away. We see them in Delaware’s prisons — where one in two men living in incarceration are Black despite only making up less than a quarter of the state’s population. 

We see them in my brother, Jeremy McDole, a paraplegic who was murdered by police officers as he sat in his wheelchair. No charges have been brought to this day. My work will continue until I know black and brown children in our state have the same opportunities as their white counterparts — the ability to seek justice in a truly impartial system. 

We will not continue to pretend these all white courts don’t have major consequences on our communities. It is imperative that we act now to save our democracy, and put an end to the systemic racial disparities that have plagued the Chancery Court for entirely too long. There is only one possible path to justice —where Carney has failed, and that is for the state Senate to vote downCook’s nomination and force the governor to find someone who truly represents and understands the voices and faces of the people they preside over. 

Keandra McDole is a Wilmington activist.