WASHINGTON — The Democratic-led Senate confirmed President Joe Biden’s 235th federal judge, marking a milestone for the outgoing president by surpassing the number of judges secured by former President Donald Trump.
This latest confirmation on Friday could be Biden’s last, meaning he will leave office with one Supreme Court justice, 45 appeals court judges, 187 district court judges, and two judges on the U.S. Court of International Trade.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer hailed the vote as “historic” as the gavel fell to applause in the Senate chamber.
“The majority has now confirmed more judges under President Biden than any majority has confirmed in decades. This is historic,” he said. “We have confirmed more judges than under the Trump administration, more judges than any administration in this century, more judges than any administration going back decades.”
Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., a Judiciary Committee member, called the number “very consequential” and said, “We’re very relieved.”
All the confirmed judges will serve lifetime appointments, solidifying them as a permanent part of Biden’s legacy, which Trump could partially undo as he returns to the White House and his party takes control of the Senate next month.
“These men and women have the power to uphold basic rights or to roll them back,” the White House said in a fact sheet. “President Biden is proud of his record of appointments and grateful to the Senate for its partnership in reaching this historic achievement.”
Beyond the sheer number, Biden takes pride in the types of judges he has chosen. The White House emphasized the “professional diversity” of his picks, including “more than 45 public defenders, more than 25 civil rights lawyers, and at least 10 who have represented workers,” as well as judges with experience in “immigration law, municipal law, and plaintiffs’ side work.”
Biden’s selections break from the tradition of both parties, which have typically favored prosecutors and corporate lawyers for judicial appointments. This was an early goal for Biden’s White House in choosing nominees.
The White House also highlighted “demographic diversity,” including the first Black woman on the Supreme Court, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, a former public defender, as well as a “record number of women, Black, Latino, AANHPI, Native American, Muslim-American, and LGBTQ judges.”
While Biden has surpassed Trump’s number of judicial appointments, he lags behind in one significant area: Trump appointed three Supreme Court justices, two of whom shifted the court to the right, creating a 6-3 majority that is considered the most conservative in nearly a century.
Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, criticized Biden’s slate of judges.
“I found it astonishing that Senate Democrats were willing to rubber-stamp absolute zealots to be judges,” he said.
Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, the incoming chair of the Judiciary Committee, vowed that Republicans would ensure Trump finishes his second term with a higher total of judicial appointments than Biden.
“They’re going to brag about having 235 instead of Trump’s 234,” Grassley told NBC News. “On January 20, 2029, Trump will brag about having 240.”
Given the fewer vacancies Trump and the upcoming GOP-controlled Senate will inherit, Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, said Republicans are unlikely to replicate that number in the next four years.
“That’d be pretty impressive to beat,” Cornyn said.
Republicans don’t need to compete numerically with Biden’s term; they just need to “be diligent about filling those, because those are obviously lifetime appointments,” he added.
Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., said the moment has little significance for Biden and Democrats.
“It means they’ve gotten one more than 234 but one less than 236,” he said in an interview.
Kennedy believes Trump might “do things differently” in his second term and “become more involved” with lower court nominees after largely deferring to others on district court and appeals court picks during his first term.
He recalled not liking all of Trump’s first-term picks.
“I thought his nominees in his first term were generally good. There were four or five that I helped kill,” Kennedy said. “I talked to him every time I did it. He always told me, if you have a nominee that I put forward, who’s not qualified, knock them into a new zip code. And I did, along with a couple of my colleagues.”
Blumenthal said Democrats believe that “every vacancy left open is the potential for an unqualified ideologue” picked by Trump and Republicans next year, who “will be there for decades.”
“I’m not ready to uncork the champagne just because we’ve done some really good work over the last four years,” Blumenthal said. “We need to be prepared for the worst, hope for the best, and try to defeat nominees who are truly unqualified. We have our work cut out. So, the prospects ahead are pretty sobering.”
