President Obama’s judicial nominees from the Bay Area are too controversial for confirmation.
That’s the word from Washington, the Associated Press is reporting.
In a deal with Senate Republicans, at least 19 of the president’s picks will win approval before Congress breaks. In exchange, Democrats won’t call for a vote on four of the picks that conservatives have groused most about.
San Francisco Magistrate Judge Edward Chen and UC-Berkeley School of Law professor Goodwin Liu are among the four.
Chen, who was nominated for a promotion to an Article III spot, has faced GOP opposition largely because of his work as a staff attorney for the ACLU.
Liu, a nominee for the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, also has been painted as too liberal. Liu also gets flak for his own criticism of a judicial nominee -- Samuel Alito. Liu was deeply critical of Alito’s rulings prior to him getting a seat on the U.S. Supreme Court.
The AP says the deal pertains to the president’s “non-controversial” nominees. Maybe Northern District nominee Edward Davila is among them. The Santa Clara County Superior Court judge who would succeed Judge Marilyn Hall Patel won unanimous approval by a Senate committee earlier this month and has escaped the kind of harsh criticism the GOP had of Chen and Liu.
A spokesperson for Sen. Barbara Boxer, who recommended Davila, didn’t immediately have an answer on his chances.
I GUESS THEY CALL THIS "CHECK AND BALANCES". THIS PROVES ONE THING, JUDGES ARE PICKED BY POLITICAL JUDICIAL PHILOSOPHY. WHICH MEANS THAT AT LEAST THE SENATORS KNOWN THIS SO STOP TEACHING LAW STUDENTS THAT JUDGES ARE PURE AND NOT BIAS (ITS TO LATE FOR ATTYS TO ACKNOWLEDGE THIS).
Posted by: THE KAT | December 22, 2010 at 08:54 AM