A federal appeals judge in California is giving Biden a vacancy to fill, while New York's governor is still backing her high court nominee. Also: Two scheduled executions. And: Many anti-trans bills.
1) With the Republicans in control of the House for the next two years, President Biden should focus on getting judges confirmed. Non-stop. He should fill every single vacancy that exists. Republicans long before the Democrats realized the importance of the courts in shaping the country, and it's long past time that the Democrats played the same game.
2) Once again, the so-called "pro life" states seem exceptionally eager to put people to death.
3) Those same Red States do love to abuse the LGBTQ community, don't they? So mean-spirited, and so completely unnecessary.
Since you seem to favor elimination of blue slips for district court nominees, I have a question: Are you prepared to see the next Republican president packing blue state district courts with judges like Aileen Cannon, Matthew Kacsmaryk, Drew Tipton, etc.?
I see a lot of people advocating elimination of blue slips and literally none of them seriously consider the risk of doing that. The usual response I get some variant of "Mitch will just get rid of blue slips for district judges anyway." But he could have done it before and didn't. The usual response to that is "Mitch cares only about his own power, not the Senate as an institution." I agree. But he still kept district court blue slips in place when he could have elimiated them.
I'm on team "the filibuster on legisdlation should be abolished or at least weakened." But no one has yet made an argument that convinces me that blue slips should be eliminated.
1) With the Republicans in control of the House for the next two years, President Biden should focus on getting judges confirmed. Non-stop. He should fill every single vacancy that exists. Republicans long before the Democrats realized the importance of the courts in shaping the country, and it's long past time that the Democrats played the same game.
2) Once again, the so-called "pro life" states seem exceptionally eager to put people to death.
3) Those same Red States do love to abuse the LGBTQ community, don't they? So mean-spirited, and so completely unnecessary.
Since you seem to favor elimination of blue slips for district court nominees, I have a question: Are you prepared to see the next Republican president packing blue state district courts with judges like Aileen Cannon, Matthew Kacsmaryk, Drew Tipton, etc.?
I see a lot of people advocating elimination of blue slips and literally none of them seriously consider the risk of doing that. The usual response I get some variant of "Mitch will just get rid of blue slips for district judges anyway." But he could have done it before and didn't. The usual response to that is "Mitch cares only about his own power, not the Senate as an institution." I agree. But he still kept district court blue slips in place when he could have elimiated them.
I'm on team "the filibuster on legisdlation should be abolished or at least weakened." But no one has yet made an argument that convinces me that blue slips should be eliminated.
Is it true that Watford is the only appeals court judge for whom no nomi nee has been named? I counted four at the end of last year:
1. Jeffrey Howard of first circuit, who took senior status on March 31, 2022
2. Diana Motz, of 4th circuit, who took senior status on Sep 30, 2022
3. Gregg Costa, of 5th circuit, who retired on Aug 31, 2022
4. Michael Kanne, of 7th circuit, who died in June 2022
Plus Watford makes five.
I don;t think anyone has yet been nominated for any of those positions.