Amidst the breaking news of the alleged leaks by Justice Alito, the fear of a severe crisis in the Supreme Court is growing. We are calling for immediate Congressional action and organizing around a broader, stronger public response to the numerous ethics violations surfacing over the last few years. Additionally, our pressure campaign to see swift action on the long list of exceptionally qualified -- and exceptionally patient -- nominees continues.
On Wednesday, the Senate voted to confirm two nominees to the federal bench. Anne M. Nardacci was confirmed to the United States District Court for the Northern District of New York, and Camille L. Velez-Rive was confirmed to the United States District Court for the District of Puerto Rico. With these confirmations, the Biden administration has made 87 confirmations since 2021, including 61 district court judges, 25 circuit court judges, and one Supreme Court justice. However, even as we celebrate this progress the clock is ticking and vacancies are growing, so there’s still much more work to do!
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The Good News
Not only did the Senate confirm two nominees this week, but also the Senate Judiciary Committee began moving more nominees through the Committee. On Wednesday, the Senate Judiciary Committee held a hearing on the nomination of Judge Jonathan Grey (E.D. Mich.), Julia Kobick (D. Mass.), Judge Rita Lin (N.D. Cal.), Judge Ramon Reyes (E.D.N.Y.), and Judge James Simmons (S.D. Cal.). Alliance for Justice wrote letters of support for Judge Rita Lin and Judge Ramon Reyes, two great future district court judges.
Judge Lin has served as a judge on the Superior Court of San Francisco, California since 2018. If confirmed, Judge Lin would be the second Asian Pacific American woman to serve on the District Court for the Northern District of California. Notably, as a person with a hearing impairment, she is President Biden’s second nominee with a disability. She shared that her disability has taught her the importance of listening and knowing that you might not be operating with all the facts. These are two important lessons for any judge to keep in mind.
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What's Next
We are closely watching several important upcoming events. On December 1st, the Senate Judiciary Committee voted several nominees out of committee, including Judge Maria Araujo Kahn (2nd Cir.), Judge Daniel Calabretta (E.D. Cal.), Matthew Garcia (D. N.M.), Araceli Martinez-Olguin (N.D. Cal.), Justice Adrienne Nelson (D. Or.), Jamal Whitehead (W.D. Wash.), and Julie Rikelman (1st Cir.). Rikelman will need a discharge motion before she can be confirmed. Next, on December 6th, we will hopefully learn the results of Georgia’s Senate runoff race. The results of the election could mean that the Vice President will no longer be needed on the floor to break ties on strict party-line votes.
Lastly, we are also keeping an eye on two big cases heading to the Supreme Court next week: Moore v. Harper and 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis. Moore, a redistricting case out of North Carolina, could have serious implications for voting rights and the future of our democracy itself. If the Court accepts the radical “independent state legislature” theory, it will effectively allow state legislatures to set their own rules for presidential and congressional elections, stripping state courts of the power to strike down anti-democratic laws.
303 Creative LLC v. Elenis involves a Colorado graphic designer who wants to refuse to create websites for same-sex couples. A decision in favor of the designer would invalidate the Colorado law prohibiting discrimination against LGBTQ+ customers, as well as any other state laws that provide similar protections. It would give business owners an unfettered right to discriminate, which harkens back to the abuses of Jim Crow era discrimination.
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