Trump’s first judicial nominee Hermandorfer moves ahead to final confirmation vote in Senate

WASHINGTON (CN) — President Donald Trump’s nominee for a key appellate vacancy — and the first federal court appointment of his second term — is one step away from confirmation after she cleared a key procedural hurdle Thursday afternoon in the Senate.

The upper chamber voted 51-43 to approve cloture on Whitney Hermandorfer’s nomination to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, limiting debate on the appointee and teeing up a final vote in the coming days. If confirmed, Hermandorfer will represent a key milestone in the second Trump administration, marking the president’s first federal judge approved by the Senate this term.

And she’ll be the first White House court nominee in decades to be confirmed without formal vetting from the country’s foremost legal professional organization.

Hermandorfer, alongside a slate of federal district court nominees tapped by the Trump administration earlier this year, advanced through the Republican-led Senate Judiciary Committee last month without any input from the American Bar Association, which has long helped inform lawmakers on presidential court picks by reviewing their qualifications and rating their experience.

The Justice Department in May announced that it would no longer give the ABA privileged access to non-public information on White House judicial nominees, such as their bar records, which the organization has historically used to draft its ratings. Attorney General Pam Bondi accused the ABA of being an “activist” group and claimed that the organization has favored the nominees of Democratic presidents.

And the lack of formal ratings from the ABA came as Democrats worried that Hermandorfer and other Trump judges would serve as political loyalists rather than dispassionate arbiters of the law.

As the Senate Judiciary Committee approved her nomination last month, Senate Minority Whip Dick Durbin argued that the Sixth Circuit nominee provided an example of the qualities the president looks for in his judicial picks, such as “loyalty and willingness to rule in favor of him.”

Durbin claimed that Trump expects Hermandorfer to be a “reliable ally on the Sixth Circuit for many years to come.”

Democrats have also dialed in on Hermandorfer’s work as director of the strategic litigation division within the Tennessee attorney general’s office. During her June nomination hearing, lawmakers pressed her on an amicus brief she submitted to the Supreme Court supporting the White House executive order rolling back birthright citizenship.

Hermandorfer told the Judiciary Committee at the time that the brief had been cited by the high court as “especially well-written,” adding that she hoped her friend-of-the-court filing had provided helpful information to the justices.

The nominee’s comparatively short professional record was also a stumbling block for Democrats. Delaware Senator Chris Coons said her experience was marked by a “striking brevity” — Hermandorfer graduated from law school in 2015.

“That lack of experience is a serious concern as we consider her for a lifetime position,” Durbin said last month.

Before joining the Tennessee attorney general’s office, Hermandorfer clerked for now-Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh when he was a judge on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals. She also clerked for Justice Samuel Alito and Justice Amy Coney Barrett, and has been a private practice attorney.

A final vote on Hermandorfer’s nomination has yet to be scheduled, but she could face her last ballot in the Senate as soon as Friday.

Only one Republican did not vote in favor of limiting debate on Hermandorfer’s nomination Thursday afternoon — North Carolina Senator Thom Tillis, who recently announced that he would no longer seek reelection.

The upper chamber is also expected to soon consider a slate of court nominees tapped by the Trump administration for vacancies on federal district courts in Missouri and Florida. Those appointees, like Hermandorfer, have not been formally vetted by the ABA.

William Bay, the legal organization’s president, has pushed back on the Trump administration’s move to cut ABA out of the judicial selection process. In a scathing letter to Bondi, he argued that the attorney general’s claims about political bias at the ABA were “based on incorrect information.”

Nearly all of the judicial nominees the ABA has rated over the last 20 years were considered qualified or well-qualified, Bay pointed out. Those appointees, he added, included those selected by Trump during his first administration.

Despite its lack of privileged information from the White House, the ABA has published ratings for Hermandorfer and several other Trump nominees. All received a score of “well-qualified.”

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