WASHINGTON (CN) - The Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday approved seven more of President Donald Trump's judicial nominees, including four to federal appeals courts.
Eleventh Circuit nominee Justice Britt Grant has served on the Georgia Supreme Court since 2017, when Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal appointed her. Prior to taking a set on the state court bench, Grant served as the state's solicitor general from 2012 to 2016.
A member of the conservative Federalist Society, Grant also worked in the Bush White House in several roles from 2001 to 2004 before she attended law school at Stanford.
It was her time as Georgia solicitor general that drew the most questions from senators as she worked through the confirmation process, as Democrats raised concerns about briefs she helped draft and positions she took in court on behalf of the state.
These concerns included her role in drafting a friend of the court brief Georgia joined in Shelby County v. Holder, the Supreme Court case that struck down portions of the Voting Rights Act. In the brief, Georgia took the position that the requirement that some states receive pre-clearance for changes to their voting laws was built on outdated data that needed to be updated, a position with which the court eventually agreed.
Georgia also joined a brief in Obergefell v. Hodges, the case that found a constitutional right to marriage, and in the challenge to the Obama administration's executive action that sought to give protection from deportation to people in the country illegally who have children who are citizens or lawful permanent residents.
Grant repeatedly told senators who asked about these cases that her job as solicitor general was very different than her job as a judge. She said when she reviewed and edited briefs for the state, she was working to represent her client and that the positions the state took did not necessarily square her own views on the issues.
"It's not my decision what the law should be, it's my decision to determine what the law is, what the Constitution requires, what the statute requires and how those and other precedents come up with a result in a particular case," Grant said at her nomination hearing in May. "That's what I do as a judge and I think it's very important, as I've said, to understand that that's our role and not a different role. If I wanted to make policy, then I should have run for the state assembly."
The committee approved her nomination on an 11-10, party-line vote.
The committee also approved David Porter, a Third Circuit nominee who has worked at the Pittsburgh firm Buchanan Ingersoll & Rooney since 1994. A member of the Federalist Society, Porter received a hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee despite not receiving the approval of Sen. Bob Casey, D-Pa., who said the White House nominated the Pittsburgh lawyer despite Casey clearly stating his objections.
Under the tradition known as the blue slip, home-state senators traditionally must sign off before a nominee is able to receive a hearing, but Sen. Chuck Grassley, the Iowa Republican who chairs the committee, has said he will not allow a single senator to hold up the nomination of a circuit court judge whose court hears cases from multiple states.