President Joe Biden released his 13th round of federal judicial nominations Wednesday, marking another notch in his speedy efforts to appoint judges as he raises the total number of nominees since last January to 83.
Biden’s record-setting pace for judicial nominations comes as key legislation under his Build Back Better agenda has faced significant pitfalls in Congress, coupled with a slipping public approval rating, according to data from FiveThirtyEight showing 52% disapproval and 42% approval as of Wednesday.
But Biden’s eight nominations announced on Wednesday further cement his efforts to reshape the federal judiciary with historic diversity, including the first Muslim woman nominee, Nusrat Jahan Choudhury, for the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York.
Seven of the eight new selections are also women nominees — two black women, a Latina, an Asian American, a Taiwanese immigrant, and another nominee who identifies as Latino, Asian American, and white. In total, 62 out of Biden’s 83 selections are women.
“President Biden has spent decades committed to strengthening the federal bench, which is why he continues to move rapidly to fill judicial vacancies,” the White House said in a readout. “And he has won confirmation of the most lower court judges for the first year of a presidency since the Kennedy Administration.”
BIDEN GETS 40 JUDGES CONFIRMED IN FIRST YEAR, DOUBLE TRUMP’S NUMBER
Forty-one of Biden’s nominees had been confirmed by the Senate as of Jan. 12, doubling the number of federal judges confirmed under former President Donald Trump in 2017, the first year of his administration.
White House chief of staff Ron Klain touted the significant milestone on Twitter in December, saying, “I remember when the GOP used to say that Trump’s judicial picks were alone enough to prove his leadership. He won confirmation of 19 judges in 2017.”
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Democrats in Congress raced to confirm Biden’s nominees in the first year of his term amid efforts by the Republican minorities in both chambers to offset the record-breaking trend. Biden’s success can largely be attributed to his targeting of “states with no Republican senators or courts with no senators at all,” Russell Wheeler, a governance studies expert with the Brookings Institution, told the Washington Examiner in December.
The strategy has allowed the White House to secure confirmations quickly, with little partisan resistance, as Republican Party leaders have touted their belief in a chance to win back the House majority in the 2022 midterm elections.
