Senate Judiciary advances Biden nominees, but punts on circuit pick panned by GOP

WASHINGTON (CN) — Forging ahead with their goal of outpacing former President Donald Trump’s judicial confirmations, Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday approved a slate of Biden administration U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals picks — but left aside a circuit court appointment that at least one Republican senator vehemently opposes.

The upper chamber’s legal affairs panel did not move ahead with the nomination of Ryan Park, tapped for a vacancy on the Fourth Circuit, in the absence of North Carolina Senator Thom Tillis. During a morning business meeting, Illinois Senator and Judiciary Committee chairman Dick Durbin explained that Tillis had asked to hold over the nominee while he was home taking care of a family member.

If confirmed, Park would join the bench on the appellate court with jurisdiction over Tillis’ home state of North Carolina. But the lawmaker has long contended that the White House did not adequately consult him or fellow Tar Heel State Senator Ted Budd on the nominee.

During a July confirmation hearing at which Park was invited to testify, Tillis slammed the Biden administration for the move. It was a slight which he said was worsened by the fact that he has been a voice for bipartisanship on Biden’s judicial picks.

The North Carolina Republican also claimed he had already secured enough votes to sink Park’s nomination if it came up for a vote in the full Senate. Such a feat, though, would require him to flip some Democrats. Tillis at the time refused to say who he’d convinced to break with the majority.

He issued another threat to hold up all the Biden administration’s pending judicial nominees in North Carolina, including several U.S. district court picks.

“If they can’t negotiate with somebody who has a record of supporting Obama nominees and Biden nominees, and they treat me like this, they needn’t waste their time on talking about the district vacancies,” he told reporters in July. “We’ll deal with that next year.”

Until recently, the Senate abided by a longstanding tradition known as blue-slipping, by which home state senators could offer their support or opposition to presidential judicial nominees. But, under the Trump administration, Republicans backed away from that precedent for the appellate courts.

The Democratic majority has continued that trend, refusing to honor blue slips for U.S. circuit nominees but accepting senators’ input for U.S. district court appointments. Facing complaints from Tillis and other GOP lawmakers, Durbin has repeatedly argued that there can’t be different standards for Republican and Democratic nominees.

Members of both parties — including Tillis — have expressed interest in returning to “regular order” under which the Judiciary Committee would honor blue slips for all judicial nominees, but an effort to kickstart that process has yet to emerge.

The Judiciary Committee on Thursday advanced four Biden administration nominees for federal district courts, including Byron Conway, nominated to the Eastern District of Wisconsin, Jonathan Hawley, tapped for the Central District of Illinois and April Perry, the White House’s nominee for the Northern District of Illinois.

It was Perry’s second time before the Judiciary Committee; last year she was selected to become a U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, but Ohio Senator JD Vance blocked her nomination. Vance, who’s now running for the White House alongside Trump, had resolved to block the Biden administration’s U.S. attorney appointments as retribution for the Justice Department’s prosecution of the former president.

Conway, Hawley and Perry all cleared the committee on bipartisan, 13-8, votes.

The panel also narrowly approved Gail Weilheimer to fill a vacancy on the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. Lawmakers advanced her nomination on an 11-10 vote along party lines.

Democrats are pushing hard to confirm as many Biden judges as possible before the November election, in an effort to surpass the 234 nominees confirmed under the Trump administration. As of Thursday, the Senate has locked in 210 of the White House’s court picks — and Democrats are optimistic about their odds of topping Trump’s numbers.

If lawmakers were hoping to mark that achievement before the election, however, they are quickly running out of time. Senators are scheduled to leave Washington for their home states at the end of next week, and the chamber won’t reconvene again until Nov. 12.

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