The Senate Judiciary Committee is currently conducting hearings to confirm the first judicial nominees of President Donald Trump’s second term, including Whitney D. Hermandorfer for the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals and several district court judges in Missouri. This initiative continues Trump’s long-standing objective of appointing conservative judges to the federal bench, a priority that was a major focus during his first term.
The confirmation process has already sparked debate over partisanship and the impact of recent changes in the judicial nomination process. Judiciary Chair Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) reminded his colleagues that some judicial nominees during the Biden era received bipartisan support, even though many were controversial to Republicans. Grassley expressed concern that partisanship could hamper efforts to confirm these nominees, referring to remarks from ranking member Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), who recently suggested he could seek to block swift consideration of future U.S. attorney nominees.
Durbin defended his threats by pointing to similar tactics deployed by Vice President JD Vance when he was a Republican senator from Ohio, during which time he moved to slow-walk confirmation of former President Joe Biden’s judicial nominees. The two committee leaders also sparred over the Trump administration’s decision to stymie the American Bar Association’s influence on the judicial selection process, which stipulates that nominees will no longer respond to the A.B.A.’s questionnaire or conduct interviews with the organization prior to confirmation.
Durbin argued the administration’s decision could prevent senators from knowing whether the nominees are qualified for their roles. Grassley maintained that the ABA could still send letters to the committee, like other organizations, but criticized the group as a