The Rush to Confirm Conservative Judges

and on Bloomberg dot com slash podcast. The Senate has confirmed the youngest person nominated by President Trump to be a federal Appeals Court judge, the thirty seven year old Alison Jones Rushing once worked for the Alliance Defending Freedom, a conservative Christian organization that is designated as an anti lgbt Q hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center. Joining me is Carl Tobias, professor at the University of

Richmond Law School. Carl She's only practiced law for nine years and has been co counsel on only four cases that went to verdict or judgment. Is she qualified to sit on a circuit court that is just below the Supreme Court? Well, that's a good question. There have been some other people who similarly situated who have served on the appeals courts. She points to her clerking for Justice Thomas Justice Corsage on the Tenth Circuit and Judge Sentel on the d c Circuit and says that, uh supplements

her experience. And I think she's filed some fifty briefs and appellate courts. Uh, so she has some experience. The A b A likes to see twelve years of practice experience when it makes its ratings. So what drew her to the attention of the Trump administration to make her, you know, eligible for one of these key spots. Well, I think the Federalist Society and Leonard Leo, the executive Vice president, who's the pre eminent advisor to the president

on these nominations. And so I think that's what put her on the radar, and I think that's what um allowed her to be confirmed so quickly. She was opposed by a coalition of more than two hundred civil rights organizations. They called her an ideological extremist who opposed same sex marriage and remedies for discriminatory lending practices, among other things. Was that addressed in her hearings, Not really, because her hearings were held I think after the Senate had recessed

to go campaign in October. Uh, And so she wasn't really wasn't questioned very rigorously, and most of the questions actually came from Republicans like Senator Kennedy from Louisiana, and he was concerned about her lack of life experience and lack of practice experience, and he raised those concerns, but he voted for her list at all the Republicans, right, so all fifty three Republicans voted for her, while the

rest of the Senate voted against her. Why are these nominations being rushed through when there are only eleven circuit court positions out of one six seven that are vacant. Why they need to rush Well, the President has campaigned on and made good on his campaign promise to uh fill the vacancies at the appellate level. They're one level

blows Supreme court. They're really the supreme courts in the regions around the country because the Supreme Court here so a few minutes, so few cases, uh, And so they have accentuated that to the exclusion of everything else, really including legislation. And we do have a hundred twenty nine federal district court vacancies is just nearly but that just reflects the incredible emphasis on the appeals courts because more

policies made there. The hot button issues are finally resolved there around the country, and so that's being emphasized by the White House and the Senate. The Senate confirmation of Trump's thirty appeals court judges is more than any other president two years into a term, and Mitch McConnell wants to continue this rapid pace exactly. And this week we'll have three more. There are two more that are going to be uh, probably confirmed today and tomorrow for the

sixth Circuit. That will bring his total to thirty four. And they're more in the wings, so um, they are moving in. It's conceivable this year there could be no vacancies on the appeals courts. When was the last time that's happened. I think you have to go back decades actually, uh to have that few, which is great for the

courts in terms of resolving appeals. The questions are, you know these people will have life tenure and serve years and decades after the president has long left the White House. Democrats are taking a particularly hardstance on one of the nominee's Chad Readler, based on his recent advocating against the Affordable Care Act, and Eric Murphy has argued against marriage equality. Is President Trump nominating moderate conservatives or are they more

radical conservatives? Are they ideologues? Well, I think Democrats, at least most of them believe that a number are, and there's a fair amount of data to show that in terms of their positions on a number of issues at least that they've argued as lawyers Republican responses. Of course, they're just representing their clients, um. But I think it's fair to say that they're very conservative, probably more conservative

than President Bush's nominees for the appellate bench um. And so I think that's what concerns a number of people. So would you say that they're less like Chief Justice John Roberts, who is more of a moderate, and more like Justice Neil Gorsch, Well, I would say they're closer to Justice Thomas and a number of the appellate judges were his clerks, and probably closer to Justice scalia Um

in terms of their views. But again they're not completely uniform there conservative number of issues, especially the culture war issues like abortion, freedom of religion, um, those kinds of questions. In any of these cases, have any of the Republicans broken ranks and voted against the nominations because they seem to be sailing through. They are pretty much. A number

of them are party line votes. Uh. There were a few moderate nominees, such as the person for Hawaii, and a number of Republicans voted against him, but that's about the only one I can think of. In Senator Kennedy was the sole person to asked a single no vote on any of President Trump's judicial nominees. So that gives you a sense of how few no votes there have

been on the Republican side. Are we at the point yet where there are enough Trump appointees on the federal appellate courts to make a difference to tip the balance. Well probably not in some yes, if you count Republican and Democratic appointee presidents. But what's critical, I think is most of them are replacing Republican appointed uh judges, and

so it's not as much of a difference. So of course you're having someone who's in her thirties or forties as opposed to someone who's in sixties or seventies, and so it's beginning to make a difference and will in the long run. All Right, Thanks so much, Carl, As always, that's Carl Tobias is a professor at the University of Richmond Law School. Thanks for listening to the Bloomberg Law Podcast. You can subscribe and listen to the show on Apple Podcasts, SoundCloud,

and on bloomberg dot com slash podcast. I'm June Grosso. This is Bloomberg