Judicial Nominations

By E. Sebastian Arduengo

One of the country’s most significant federal appeals courts has morphed into a hotbed of activist judges striking longstanding federal regulations, says columnist Steven Pearlstein. And at a time when some corporations claim they are hesitant to hire because of regulatory uncertainty.

(The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit  is so important because it has the responsibility of reviewing most of the rules and interpretative decisions made by federal agencies in the capital. It has also been seen as the U.S. Supreme Court’s farm team, as Chief Justice Roberts and Justices Scalia, Thomas, and Ginsburg are all former D.C. circuit judges.)

For example, The Washington Post columnist Pearlstein notes that just before Labor day, Judge Brett Kavanaugh, an appointee of President George W. Bush and possible Supreme Court contender under a Republican administration, issued a ruling in Homer City Generation v. EPA. The case involved the Cross-State Air Pollution Rule, where the EPA was trying to regulate the amount of pollution states could dump on other, “downwind” states. As Pearlstein puts it, from Kavanaugh’s decision, “You’d have no idea that hundreds of dedicated, highly trained scientists, analysts and statisticians at the EPA might have spent more than a decade devoted to the extremely complex task of figuring out how much of the ozone or sulfur dioxide in the air in Rhode Island originated in Indiana.”

by Jeremy Leaming

Republicans keeping to their obstructionist ways blocked an effort by Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid to force votes on 17 district court nominations that have languished in the chamber.

Obstruction of President Obama’s judicial nominations has been ongoing since the start of his first term, and the federal bench has a record number of vacancies, more than 80. Sen. Reid had called for unanimous consent to secure confirmation votes for 17 district court nominations. “There are places around the country where we have judges who are tremendously overworked on these cases,” Reid said.

But Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell objected to the move, claiming the president has been treated fairly.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, who has consistently called out Republicans’ obstruction of the president’s judicial selections, decried today’s action.

Leahy noted that Obama’s predecessors did not face this kind of trouble appointing judges to the federal bench, especially district court judges.

“However,” Leahy said in a press statement, “Senate Republicans have raised the level of partisanship so that these Federal trial court nominees have now become wrapped around the axle of partisanship. Despite a vacancy crisis that threatens the ability of Federal courts to provide justice for the American people, Senate Republicans now refuse to allow a vote on any of the 17 pending district court nominees, including 12 that have been declared judicial emergency vacancies.”