NBC News is reporting that a controversial judicial nominee is in danger of being derailed in the U.S. Senate because of objections over his past work defending state laws viewed as discriminatory and senate leadership’s refusal to vote on legislation aimed at protecting special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation.

NBC reporters Leigh Ann Caldwell and Frank Thorp V explain: “Thomas Farr, President Donald Trump’s nominee to be a U.S. District Court judge for the Eastern District of North Carolina, has come under fire because of his work on cases that Democrats say have disenfranchised African Americans from voting. That issue has at least one GOP senator, Tim Scott of South Carolina, undecided on whether to support Farr’s confirmation.”

And Republican Sen. Jeff Flake of Arizona is blocking all judicial nominees, including Farr’s, until GOP leaders agree to hold a vote on a bill to put up guardrails against any threat of Trump firing special counsel Robert Mueller.

Read the NBC News article.

The Federal Bar Association during its Capitol Hill Day on April 26, 2018, will urge President Trump and the United States Senate to honor their Constitutional responsibilities to nominate judicial nominees and promptly act upon those nominations, in response to a growing vacancy crisis afflicting the federal courts.

“Today there are nearly 150 judicial vacancies in our nation’s courts, representing 18 percent of all Article III federal judgeships, said Kip Bollin, president of the Federal Bar Association. “Judicial vacancies mean that our federal courts are not being staffed at the level Congress intended, triggering the slower dispensation of justice.”

In addition to judicial vacancies, FBA leaders participating in Capitol Hill Day will urge Congress to adequately fund the federal courts, establish additional federal judgeships in high-caseload judicial districts, and establish an Article I immigration court.

W. West Allen, chair of the FBA Government Relations Committee, stated, “The Federal Bar Association represents the foremost constituency of our federal courts. As its practicing bar, we have a responsibility to remind Congress of the critical role the courts play, the challenges they face, and their ongoing needs.”

Last year, the annual FBA advocacy event broke all-time attendance records involving FBA national, circuit, chapter, section, and division leaders. Working off a common agenda of FBA policy priorities, FBA leaders participated in over 200 meetings with House and Senate offices across the Hill.

Read more about Capitol Hill Day.

Judiciary

A BuzzFeed News report covers the story of a federal judge in Ohio who is suing the federal judiciary, claiming that other judges violated his constitutional rights in ordering him to undergo a mental health screening.

Reporter Zoe Tillman writes that US District Judge John Adams, who sits in Akron, faced disciplinary action after a panel of judges found that he mistreated another official in his courthouse and refused to cooperate with an investigation into his behavior by undergoing a mental health exam.

The basis for the order involved a magistrate judge, Tillman explains:

“After a magistrate judge missed a deadline that Adams had set for completing work on a case in February 2013, Adams issued an order that the magistrate judge explain why that magistrate judge should not be held in contempt. The magistrate judge submitted an explanation, and Adams accepted it.”

Read the BuzzFeed article.

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