Senate Democrats celebrated Tuesday the confirmation of President Biden’s 100th judge, touting the speed in placing progressive, diverse judges on the federal bench.
“Senate Democrats have focused intensely on expanding the diversity of our courts, and not just in terms of demographics but in terms of experience, professional experience too,” said Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer, New York Democrat. “We are working hard not only to add more women, more people of color, more lawyers from unique backgrounds to the bench, but people of different walks of life.”
He said the first three judges confirmed since the start of the year were historic:
• DeAndrea Benjamin will be the first woman of color to be a judge for the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit.
• Cindy Chung will be the first Asian American judge to sit on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit.
• Gina Méndez-Miró will be the first openly LGBTQ judge on the U.S. District Court of Puerto Rico bench.
Mr. Biden has seen 30 circuit court judges and 69 district court judges confirmed, as well as one Supreme Court justice, Ketanji Brown Jackson — totaling his 100 judicial appointments.
By contrast, former President Donald Trump confirmed 85 judicial nominees at this point in his tenure, and former President Barack Obama appointed 67.
It took the Democrat-controlled Senate two years and 26 days to hit the mark. It took Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell, Kentucky Republican, two years, three months and 13 days to reach the same milestone under Mr. Trump.
Overall Mr. Trump saw 234 of his judicial nominees confirmed to the bench during his four-year tenure in office. That included 53 appellate court judges and three nominees to the Supreme Court, which flipped the balance of power to the conservative wing of the bench.
Mr. Biden made a promise in his 2020 presidential campaign to appoint the first Black woman to the high court should there be a vacancy. He made good on that when Justice Stephen G. Breyer retired last year, tapping Justice Jackson.
Mr. Biden’s nominees have been mostly young, diverse and representative of different backgrounds of experience than most judicial appointees of prior presidents, court watchers have observed.
His nominees also don’t seem to be from big law firms, and many have public defender backgrounds rather than typical prosecutorial experience.
Legal experts say it could take years to see how Mr. Biden’s appointments impact the judiciary and court rulings.
“I think Biden has been very effective at appointing many women and minority judges to the federal bench. I have yet to see any Biden judges make a noticeable impact on the law. By contrast, many of the Trump judges quickly made their marks,” said Josh Blackman, a professor at South Texas College of Law.
Mr. Biden said the diverse judicial appointments have been some of his proudest achievements while in office.
“We have made important progress in ensuring that the federal judiciary not only looks more like the nation as a whole, but also includes judges from professional backgrounds that have been historically underrepresented on the bench,” the president said. “To that end, I have appointed more federal circuit judges with experience as public defenders than all prior presidents combined. Seventy-six percent of the Article III judges confirmed during my administration have been women, and 68% have been people of color.”
Mike Davis, president of the Article III Project, called Mr. Biden’s nominees “radical” and urged Republican senators to stop supporting the confirmations.
“Elections have consequences, and President Biden and Senate Democrats are appointing radical judges at a record pace. Senate Republicans must stop helping them, by rolling over and playing dead — and even voting for Biden’s radical nominees,” Mr. Davis said. “Senate Democrats don’t actually care about diversity on the federal bench, as they proved with their vicious opposition to women and minority judicial nominees from Republican presidents. Senate Democrats simply want leftwing judicial activists who will do their political bidding from the bench.”
• Haris Alic can be reached at halic@washingtontimes.com.
• Alex Swoyer can be reached at aswoyer@washingtontimes.com.
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