The Senate Judiciary Committee is preparing to vote on a judge to fill the seat vacated by Supreme Court Associate Justice Amy Coney Barrett, as well as several other seats on lower courts, allowing President Donald Trump to continue shaping the courts, Fox News reports.
The panel will vote Thursday on whether to appoint Thomas L. Kirsch II, the current U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Indiana, to the U.S. 7th Circuit Court of Appeals. They will also vote on Charles Edward Atchley Jr. and Katherine A. Crytzer, who were both nominated to serve as judges for the Eastern District of Tennessee, on Joseph Dawson III’s nomination for the District of South Caolina, and on Zachary Somers for the U.S. Court of Federal Claims.
There are three current or upcoming vacancies on appeals courts and 59 on district and specialty courts, along with 35 nominations currently pending.
“People focus less on district courts because they decide cases rather than make legal precedent,” said Curt Levey, the president of the Committee for Justice, a “constitutionalist” nonprofit. “But we have seen rogue district judges impose national injunctions during the Trump administration. They can make it difficult for a president and slow the administration of justice. What district courts do matter. A Trump-appointed district judge will be very different from a Biden-appointed district judge.”