After years of inaction on Obama nominees, Senate voting on federal judges
*The fact that the vote is finally coming to the Senate is a direct consequence of the re-writing of Senate filibuster rules. Eighty-nine judges were pushed-through after the change. Before that the judicial approval process in the Senate had been needlessly slow, with GOP leadership accused of stalling the process for election politics’ sake. VL
By Andrew Taylor, Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) — After more than 400 days, Luis Felipe Restrepo is finally getting a confirmation vote in the Senate that would make him the first Hispanic federal judge from Pennsylvania on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit.
With Monday’s vote on the federal judge from Philadelphia, the Senate will have cleared its to-do list of nominees to the powerful appeals courts. Nine vacancies will remain, but President Barack Obama has yet to nominate people for those posts. Among federal trial and appeals judges, 29 of Obama’s nominees – out of 72 current vacancies – await votes. The Judiciary Committee has approved 13 of them, all by routine voice votes.
The vacancy rate for the federal judiciary rivals recent lows, and the number of current vacancies is slightly higher than it was when Obama took office seven years ago.
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[Photo courtesy of Tulane University]
