Ketanji Brown Jackson says she grew emotional during Cory Booker's speech because 'it felt like someone understood how difficult it had been'

• Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson described why she was moved to tears during her confirmation hearing.
• Sen. Cory Booker's comments about her nomination's historic nature was a "breath of fresh air," Jackson said.

Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson explained in a rare interview published Monday why she grew emotional when Sen. Cory Booker spoke up during her historic Supreme Court nomination hearing.

Booker's comments brought her to tears, Jackson explained in an interview with The Washington Post, because it felt like someone truly understood how grueling the process had been for her to get to that moment.

"It had been 18 hours of questioning. I was exhausted and also, in a sense, relieved — it felt like someone understood how difficult it had been and how much this particular position meant to a lot of people," she said.

Booker's emotional tribute remains a lasting moment from Jackson's hearings. The New Jersey Democrat and former presidential candidate heaped praise on Jackson and underlined the historic nature of the moment invoking famous Black women like abolitionist Harriet Tubman and Constance Baker Motley, the first Black woman to become a federal judge.

Jackson, who has called Motley one of her heroes, said that Booker's words were "a breath of fresh air." Video of the exchange shows both Jackson and Booker growing emotional. Jackson wipes away tears during part of his speech.

"That sort of aspect of it hadn't really come out very much in the hearing, and so it was a breath of fresh air, a relief in the moment that I think just led to emotion," Jackson said.

Jackson's sit down with The Post marks a rare exception to her silence since her successful confirmation. She offered only a brief take on the unprecedented leak of a draft Supreme Court opinion that would overturn abortion. A former Supreme Court clerk herself, Jackson also refused to weigh in on the merit of protests outside of justices' or whether the leak was a "good or bad thing."

"Everybody who is familiar with the court and the way in which it works was shocked by that," she said. "Such a departure from normal order."

Booker's speech came during Jackson's third and final day before lawmakers. At that point, Republicans had spent hours tearing into Jackson's record, accusing her of supporting terrorists and misleadingly suggesting that she took it easy on child pornography offenders.

"And so you faced insults here that were shocking to me, well actually not shocking," Booker said. "But you are here because of that kind of love, and nobody's taking this away from me. So you got five more folks to go through, five more of us, and then you can sit back and let us have all the debates."

Addressing Jackson directly, Booker added "I know what it's taken for you to sit in that seat.

Jackson is set to formally join the court later this summer after Associate Justice Stephen Breyer officially steps down.