Former Deputy Assistant Attorney General Tom Dupree discusses the Biden administration’s appeal against a ruling on contact with Big Tech, the push to overhaul the Supreme Court, and the impact of legal issues on the Biden and Trump campaigns. The Senate Judiciary Committee has advanced another round of President Joe Biden’s judicial nominees to a floor vote as the president aims to appoint lower court judges at a similar pace to his predecessor, Donald Trump. Biden has already secured confirmation for 144 federal judges, including Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson, which puts him on track to catch up with Trump’s numbers. However, there is still ground to cover as Trump appointed over 230 lower court judges during his term, in addition to three Supreme Court justices.
The Senate Democratic majority, seeking to impact lower courts, is pushing for the confirmation of Biden’s nominees. These nominees include state judges, prosecutors, and public defenders. One of the nominees who faced controversy during the confirmation hearing was Richard Federico, a public defender nominated for the U.S. 10th Circuit Court of Appeals. Federico was questioned about his defense of a Kansas man convicted in a child pornography case, where he requested a sentence significantly lower than the federal guidelines. Despite the controversy, Federico advanced in committee.
Another nominee, Joshua Kolar, a federal magistrate judge in Indiana, received bipartisan backing and was advanced for the U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals. However, California Superior Court Judge Eumi Lee, who was nominated for the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, drew attention from Republicans due to her past law review article on gender and prisons. Senator John Kennedy pressed Lee on her views regarding allowing male prisoners to claim transgender status for assignment to female prisons.
Critics of the Biden administration’s judicial selection process, such as Curt Levey, president of the Committee for Justice, argue that the focus on diversity and backgrounds in liberal activism has resulted in the appointment of open activists to the bench. Levey points out that previous Democratic presidents appointed judges who were lower court judges or law professors, while Biden has chosen individuals with a history of activism with organizations such as the ACLU, the NAACP, and the Brennan Center.
Overall, the advancement of Biden’s judicial nominees reflects the ongoing battle for influence over the lower courts between Democrats and Republicans. As Biden seeks to reshape the judiciary, the confirmation process continues to be a contentious arena for political debates and scrutiny of nominees’ backgrounds and past positions.
