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The Judiciary at Noon, #37: August 23 to 29, 2024

Keep up-to-date on the US federal judiciary, August 16 to 22, 2024.

Anthony Myrlados
2–3 minutes

Image courtesy of Sora Shimazaki/Pexels

Welcome to The Judiciary at Noon! Take a break from work to get an update on the oft-neglected third branch of the United States government, the judicial branch.

The series covers any updates to the federal judiciary, including any new judges confirmed, any deaths, resignations, or retirements from the courts, and any new vacancies that have occurred. It includes political analysis at the very end. All information spans the previous week.

Confirmations

No judges were confirmed for the week spanning August 23 to 29, 2024.

Vacancies

No vacancies occurred for the week spanning August 23 to 29, 2024.

70 vacancies remain on the federal judiciary, a number unchanged from a week ago.

Retirements, Deaths, and Resignations

No federal judges retired, died, or resigned in the week of August 16 to 22, 2024.

Other

  • Aug. 28, 2024: President Biden announced three new nominees to federal district courts, one each to the Northern District of New York, District of New Mexico, and District of Arizona.

Analysis

No major action, and don’t expect any for another two weeks. The Senate reconvenes on September 9th, and their first action will be to confirm two judges, a sign that judicial confirmations will be a major priority for the Democrat-controlled Senate going forward.

Observers like myself wondered if Biden would announce any new nominees this week, and he did indeed. This means we are likely seeing one of the last set of nominees of the Biden presidency.

There are just five judgeships left without a nominee in states with two Democratic Senators; three if you count Sarah Netburn, who was not reported out of committee, and Rebecca Suzanne Kanter, whose nomination was announced months ago but has yet to appear before the Senate.

We should not expect any new vacancies to occur for Biden to fill. No vacancy has been announced for a month and a half, and at this point in the year, any vacancy that is announced will likely not have a nominee, or won’t have a nominee that will appear before the Senate in time.

There are still over thirty vacancies without nominees, but they are in states where one or both Senators are Republican, and Republicans have not been cooperative with Biden on many nominees, especially during an election year. With these two factors in mind, it is clear that Biden is quickly approaching a hard limit on judicial nominations in his presidency.

Best-case scenario, Democrats could be looking at thirty-seven nominees that can be voted on by year’s end. If the Democratic Senate manages to pull off confirming them all, Biden will have appointed 242 federal judges, surpassing his predecessor Donald Trump, who appointed 234 judges.

SIGN-OFF

That’s it for this week’s The Judiciary at Noon. This has been Anthony Myrlados. I’ll see you next noon and until then I wish you all an enjoyable weekend.

5 responses to “The Judiciary at Noon, #37: August 23 to 29, 2024”

  1. Avatar
    Anonymous

    I would not totally rule out that there will come up no futher vacancy until the end of the year considering the fact, that there are another eight judges becoming eligible for retirement until the end of the year (Judge Copeland-Biggs from the Middle District of North Carolina, you have noticed twice not on the official list yet is among them), and some people use the first opportunity to go, even with short or no notice, while the other ones are staying until the very last day of their lives, fulfilling the lifetime appointment, and the latter ones are totally out of any calculations.

    So far four active judges have died during Biden’s term, one each years (Martinez at Western District of Texas in 2021, Kanne of the Seventh Circuit in 2022, Smith in 2023 and Pratter in 2024, both from the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. Except Kanne, none of them belonged to them you had really to expect it, two of them were just in their early 60s. All of them who were already old at the beginning of Biden’s term, are now even older, but they have so far endured. I see parallels with the House, where in the moment are three vacancies due to the death, and just one of them was really old, and all of them who are 85 years and older are planning to run for another term with one exception I have counted 12 of them here. In my opinion, there is a point, you either leave or stay forever. Three judges over 85 years of age went senior anyway unter Biden, what I had not expected (Dennis at the Fifth Circuit, Norgle at the Northern District of Illinois and Rovner at the Seventh Circuit), Hurd has announced to go for the second time, but I don’t see the nominee to replace him to have a majority for sure.

    Liked by 1 person

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    1. Anthony Myrlados Avatar
      Anthony Myrlados

      Many editions ago, I predicted there would be 10 to 20 vacancies in 2024. So far, there have been 12, 13 if you count Judge Biggs of MD NC. She will likely make a formal announcement or retire by the end of the year. It is absolutely possible that a few more judgeships become Vacant. My point is that at this late time, Biden will not be able to fill those vacancies. There is no longer enough time to find nominees, vet them, and put them through the Senate. Hence, if there are any more vacancies, they will not go filled by Biden, but will remain for the next President to appoint.

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  2. Avatar
    Anonymous

    I got your point, and agree with you, that it’s not totally impossible to fill an unexpected vacancy to come so far, but increasingly unlikely to get somebody confirmed with every upcoming day and the window will close completely in a few weeks.

    As there is still much work to do, and although we have plenty of time for a final rating of Biden’s term, I also see the next President has a lot of judicial emergencies to tackle and at least some amendments at the blue slip procedure regardless who will win and who has a senate majority.

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    1. Anthony Myrlados Avatar
      Anthony Myrlados

      We’ll see what other judges are confirmed these next few months, but Biden has already made a big impact. I’ve been closely mapping the courts under Biden and how they’ve shifted, I’ll release it once Biden leaves office. Seeing as how the Senate has passed the JUDGES Act in a bipartisan manner, I believe you are right that blue slip changes are coming. I think that if Harris wins some Republican Senators will relent. I see one or both of Alaska’s vacancies, Ohio’s vacancies, Kansas’ vacancy, and maybe even a few of Texas’ and Florida’s vacancies being filled. But I do not think that the Repunlican Senators from Missouri, Arkansas, NC, TN, or Alabama cooperating. Something will have to be done.

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  3. Avatar
    Anonymous

    I agrree with you completely about that. And thank you for remembering to the JUDGES Act I forgot about, also very important on the in the medium and long term.

    Liked by 1 person

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