Don't forget about Obama's other stalled federal court nominees

Rss@dailykos.com (fake Irishman) · Friday, March 18, 2016, 8:23 pm

Much of the coverage of the federal courts over the last several weeks has rightly focused on President Obama's nomination of D.C. Circuit Judge Merrick Garland to fill the Supreme Court vacancy, and the complete refusal of Republican senators to even pretend to consider him.

But we can't forget about the other court vacancies that exist. As of last month, there are 62 district court vacancies, and nine vacancies on the Courts of Appeals.

Obama currently has nominees waiting for 34 of those district court slots, and seven of the circuit court openings.

But Sen. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and his fellow Republicans will likely drag those nominations out. In 2015, the Senate confirmed one circuit judge and 10 district court judges.

In 2007, under an incoming Democratic Senate, George W. Bush was able to get six circuit court justices and 34 district judges appointed.

And during 2014, the Democratic-controlled Senate confirmed 12 circuit court judges and 76 district nominees.

(Gee, holding the Senate in the 2014 elections would have been nice, huh?)

So far this year they have managed to confirm one circuit judge and four district judges—all of whom were ready for votes last November.

Now with the Garland nomination taking up a lot of bandwidth, it's possible the McConnell and Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley can use it to claim that they don't have time to process any lower-level judges—even though they’re not actually, you know, doing any work on Garland.

Progressive activists can't let that happen. We should highlight the near total ongoing blockade in the Senate of Obama’s judicial appointees, alongside our demands for Garland.

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