WASHINGTON – U.S. Senate Democratic Whip Dick Durbin (D-IL), Ranking Member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, today delivered an opening statement at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on the nominations of Whitney Hermandorfer to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit; Zachary Bluestone to the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri; Joshua Divine to the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri and the Western District of Missouri; Maria Lanahan to the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri; and Judge Cristian Stevens to the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri.
Key Quotes:
“A decision was made last week by Attorney General Bondi that the Justice Department will no longer cooperate with the American Bar Association rating process for judicial nominees. What is going on here? Why is this being changed so abruptly? Well, you look back and you can understand if you look at the history of it. During the first term of Donald Trump, the names were submitted to the American Bar Association of each judicial nominee. Nine of those nominees were found ‘unqualified’ to serve on the federal bench by the American Bar Association. Yet President Trump in his first term pursued it anyway.”
“The nominees are subject to ratings by the American Bar Association: ‘qualified, well-qualified, [or] unqualified.’ Under Trump's first term, nine or 10 were found ‘unqualified.’ Eight of them were approved for lifetime appointment to the federal bench. So, Durbin, ‘what about your nominees under President Biden?’ 235 were approved by this committee. Were any of them found unqualified by the American Bar Association? Not one. The difference is the Attorney General has decided to protect against the vulnerability that some nominees, maybe even some today might have been found unqualified.”
“Then there's the Trump Administration's rejection of the Federalist Society… Last week, President Trump wrote on Truth Social, ‘I am so disappointed in The Federalist Society because of the bad advice they gave me on numerous Judicial Nominations.’ He also called one of the organization’s longtime leaders, Leonard Leo, ‘a real ‘sleazebag’ who ‘probably hates America…’ Yet, during his first presidential campaign, then-candidate Trump said, ‘We’re going to have great judges, conservative, all picked by the Federalist Society.’”
“Then there’s this issue that the Chairman raised, and he and I are friends, so this is not a personal thing—[I’ve] been wrestling with this between us for weeks about how to resolve it. Here's what it boils down to: [During] Trump's first term, [he nominated] 94 U.S. Attorney appointees. Democrats were in the minority in the Senate. That must’ve been a battle royale. It was not. They were all approved by voice vote in the committee [and] voice vote on the floor. We decided that we do a background check through the FBI of these U.S. Attorney nominees, and then basically agreed to them on a bipartisan basis... I think both political parties felt that was a fair process. And then something happened. One of the Senators from the State of Ohio, J.D. Vance, who went on to become Vice President, decided to object to getting these votes on the floor of the U.S. Senate, so he wanted to put two or three days of procedure into the choice of each of the U.S. Attorneys. It stopped the process.”
“I’ve been saying to Chairman Grassley: ‘you expect me to just look the other way now?’ U.S. Attorneys are coming before us, and I’m supposed to say, ‘let’s go back to voice votes again.’ One set of rules for Democrats, another for Republicans. That’s the mess we’re in. We can work this out and we should. I’ve got a hold on one nominee from Florida. I’ve spoken to both Florida Senators about it. It isn’t personal. We’ve got to find a way out of this that is fair and bipartisan. And we [can] stick with [it] for both political parties. You can’t just change the rules overnight... So, Mr. Chairman, this is more than just an ordinary meeting of nominees to be considered by this committee. This is the first time no ABA involvement, the Federalist Society is now a suspect ‘sleazebag’ group that used to be required approval for anyone to be taken seriously, and we still have to resolve the mess left behind by Vice President Vance.”
Video of Durbin’s opening statement is available here.
Audio of Durbin’s opening statement is available here.
Footage of Durbin’s opening statement is available here for TV Stations.
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