During President Biden’s term so far, nominees for federal judicial appointments have set records in terms of diversity and representation. The most recent nominees are the first of their identity in their districts or courts, with diverse professional backgrounds as well. Notable nominees include Nicole Berner, the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals’ first openly LGBTQ+ judge, Adeel Mangi, the Third Circuit Court of Appeals’ first Muslim American judge, and Cristal Brisco, the first Black female judge in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Indiana.

The White House says the record-breaking nominations are a result of Biden’s long-term goal of creating a judiciary that is representative of the nation. A memo signed by White House Counsel Ed Siskel and others states, “President Biden honored a core campaign promise, setting records when it comes to demographic and professional diversity of judicial appointees and ensuring that the federal Judiciary looks like the nation.” Of the 154 appointed life-tenured judicial nominees, two-thirds are women and two-thirds are people of color, including Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, the high court’s first Black female justice.

In June, Florida House Speaker Paul Renner submitted a letter to the state supreme court’s chief justice that recommended consolidating its judicial circuits. Renner’s letter suggested that court consolidation would “improve efficiencies and uniformities in the judicial process, thereby increasing public trust” while also cutting costs across Florida’s 20 judicial circuits. He asked Florida’s supreme court to consider the issue as part of its annual planning process, which includes making recommendations to the state legislature on administrative matters relating to the state’s courts. The supreme court formed a committee to study the matter, and in mid-November, the committee released a report rejecting the idea of consolidating the circuits.

The Judicial Circuit Assessment Committee drew from months of testimony from legal system stakeholders to inform its recommendation. The overwhelming majority of the judges, public defenders, prosecutors, sheriffs, and state representatives who provided public commentary urged the committee to reject consolidation, raising concerns that it would create significant administrative challenges, restrict access to justice, and decrease local representation. A survey conducted by the state bar association similarly found that 93.5 percent of respondents indicated that their circuit’s effectiveness would not be improved through consolidation.

Both Democratic and Republican officials voiced opposition to consolidation. State Attorney Harold Pryor, who serves Broward County, said that each geographic region is different in terms of the people, cultures, and generations that make it up, and Rep. James Mooney similarly cautioned against consolidation due to the differences between circuits. Others, including former state attorney Andrew Warren, who was removed from office by Gov. Ron DeSantis, view this as a partisan effort to gerrymander the state’s prosecutorial districts, which would also be impacted by consolidation. The Florida Supreme Court will use the committee’s final report discouraging court consolidation as it considers its broader recommendations to the state legislature on matters of court administration. The next legislative session begins in January.

Advocacy groups Scrutinize and Reinvent Albany published a new report, Open Criminal Courts: New York Criminal Court Decisions Should be Public, that analyzes the electronic publication practices of New York judges issuing criminal decisions. The report found “limited publication of written decisions by criminal court judges,” estimating that only 6 percent of their decisions are published each year. The report also documents a broad discrepancy in how individual judges approach publication: “Of the 600 New York criminal court judges who published at least one decision between 2010 and 2022, 20 judges (3%) were responsible for 28% of all published decisions, while 356 judges (59%) published three or fewer decisions.” After the report was published, State Senate Deputy Majority Leader Michael Gianaris said that he “plans to introduce legislation to require judges to report their decisions.”

The report’s coauthors, Oded Oren and Rachael Fauss, emphasize the importance of judges in criminal justice reform and why accountability and public transparency are crucial when it comes to judicial elections. Oren from Scrutinize states, “While much of the focus in criminal justice reform has been on prosecutors and law enforcement, the role of judges is equally pivotal and often overlooked. Judges are the gatekeepers of justice, interpreting and applying laws that have far-reaching implications on individual liberties and systemic injustices.”

Reinvent Albany’s Fauss echoes Oren, saying, “The public and their elected representatives cannot hold criminal court judges and the judicial branch accountable without seeing their decisions. This lack of transparency not only hampers voters’ ability to assess judicial candidates, but also undermines legislative oversight of criminal law reforms.”

In a separate article in State Court Report, Oren describes two local efforts in Brooklyn and the Bronx to increase public access to judicial decisions, one in the context of judicial selection and one aimed at judicial accountability. According to Oren, these efforts “demonstrate how access to judicial decisions can enhance advocacy, accountability, and judicial quality.”