The Senate on Monday confirmed the first federal judge of President Trump’s second term, putting the administration on a much slower pace for filling federal court vacancies than in his first term, when a rush to install conservatives on the courts was an overarching priority.
Senators voted 46 to 42 along party lines to confirm Whitney D. Hermandorfer of Tennessee to a seat on the Cincinnati-based U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. Her approval came more than six weeks later than the first appellate judge confirmed after Mr. Trump took office in 2017. The Senate had also confirmed a new Supreme Court justice by this point in his last term, placing Neil M. Gorsuch on the court.
This time around, Mr. Trump has put more emphasis on other aspects of his administration, aggressively pushing ambassadorial nominations and devoting much of the energy of the Senate to pushing through the sweeping tax and policy legislation enacted this month.
In addition, significantly fewer judicial vacancies exist today compared with 2017, when Mr. Trump inherited more than 100 court openings after Senate Republicans stalled President Barack Obama’s judicial selections when they took Senate control in 2014.
“We’re not facing the number of judicial vacancies this Congress we did during Trump’s first term,” said Senator John Thune, Republican of South Dakota and the majority leader. “There are around 50 vacancies on the federal bench. Our job is to fill those vacancies with more judges who understand the proper role of a judge, and that starts with confirming Ms. Hermandorfer.”
Ms. Hermandorfer served as director of the strategic litigation unit in the Tennessee attorney general’s office, where she has argued high-profile cases, including defending the state’s abortion ban and challenging a Biden administration prohibition on discrimination against transgender students.
She clerked for Justices Samuel A. Alito and Amy Coney Barrett on the Supreme Court and for Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh when he sat on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. At age 38, she is part of an effort by both parties to place younger judges on the bench, where they can serve for decades given their lifetime tenure, as opposed to the previous tradition of choosing lawyers with more extensive careers.
Her legal background drew criticism from Democrats.
“She has less than 10 years of legal experience,” Senator Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York and the minority leader, said on Monday. “She has never served as a chief counsel on any single case. She made a career of going after people’s reproductive rights, transgender rights and anti-discrimination policies.”
Senator Richard J. Durbin of Illinois, the top Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, also suggested that Ms. Hermandorfer had a “shocking” lack of experience for such a powerful appeals court post and noted that she ducked questions on whether Mr. Trump had lost the 2020 election.
“The fact that she’s willing to condone President Trump’s false claims further demonstrates a level of partisanship and deference to this president that is unacceptable for someone seeking a lifetime appointment,” Mr. Durbin said.
Republicans were strongly in support. Senator Charles E. Grassley, the Iowa Republican who is chairman of the Judiciary Committee, called her approval “nothing but net,” in a nod to Ms. Hermandorfer’s stint as a co-captain of the women’s varsity basketball team at Princeton.
“Ms. Hermandorfer understands the powerful role that judges have in our system of government, but even more importantly, she respects the limitations of that power,” Mr. Grassley said.
During his 2016 presidential run, Mr. Trump made his commitment to appointing conservative judges a central theme of his campaign, seeking to allay concerns on the right about his character and political leanings. In a first, he made public lists of those he said he would nominate to the Supreme Court if elected, a promise that was seen as important to his win.
With the eager cooperation of Senator Mitch McConnell, the Kentucky Republican who was then majority leader, Mr. Trump moved quickly to follow through on his judicial pledge. He ultimately placed 234 federal judges on the bench, including three Supreme Court justices after Mr. McConnell held open a vacancy that occurred with almost a year left in Mr. Obama’s tenure while another was pushed through just days before the 2020 election.
During the administration of President Joseph R. Biden Jr., Democrats worked aggressively to counter Trump’s judicial record and ultimately saw the confirmation of 235 federal judges. At this point in the Biden administration, seven judges had been confirmed.
Other judicial nominees are in the pipeline. Mr. Trump has nominated 10 people for U.S. district court seats in Missouri, Florida and Kentucky. He also put forward Emil Bove III, a former Trump defense lawyer and Justice Department official, for a seat on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, which handles cases from Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Delaware and the Virgin Islands.
Mr. Bove, who could face a committee vote on his confirmation as early as Thursday, has faced accusations from a fired Justice Department colleague that he was willing to ignore court orders in immigration cases, an accusation Mr. Bove has denied.
Carl Hulse is the chief Washington correspondent for The Times, primarily writing about Congress and national political races and issues. He has nearly four decades of experience reporting in the nation’s capital.
The post Senate Approves First Judge of Trump’s Second Term appeared first on New York Times.
