On The Bench: Week of January 18, 2024

Due to working on government funding, the Senate made limited progress on judicial nominations this week. As of this writing, the Senate has not confirmed any judicial nominees.

On Thursday, the Senate Judiciary Committee held an executive business meeting for a large batch of judicial nominees. At the meeting, the Committee voted on nominees who were renominated by the White House earlier this year. In total, the Committee advanced 19 Article III nominees to the floor: Magistrate Judge Joshua Kolar (7th Cir.), Nicole Berner (4th Cir.), Adeel Mangi (3d Cir.), Seth Aframe (1st Cir.), Lisa Wang (Ct. Int’l Trade), Joseph Laroski (Ct. Int’l Trade), Judge Amy Baggio (D. Or.), Judge Cristal Brisco (N.D. Ind.), Judge Gretchen Lund (N.D. Ind.), Judge Eumi Lee (N.D. Cal.), Magistrate Judge Mustafa Kasubhai (D. Or.), Magistrate Judge Edward Kiel (D.N.J.), Kirk Sherriff (E.D. Cal.), Sarah Russell (D. Conn.), Magistrate Judge Jacquelyn Austin (D.S.C.), Magistrate Judge Jacqueline Becerra (S.D. Fla.), Magistrate Judge Melissa Damian (S.D. Fla.), David Leibowitz (S.D. Fla.), and Magistrate Judge Julie Sneed (M.D. Fla.).

As of January 18, there are 90 Article III vacancies, 61 of which are current. Once the announced nominees are officially nominated, then there will be 31 pending nominees: 20 waiting for floor votes, 0 waiting to be reported out of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and 11 waiting for hearings before the Committee. To date, 168 Article III judges have been confirmed during the Biden-Harris Administration.