President Obama and Senate Democrats shouldn't be feeling too good about the filibuster win this week, because an even larger fight is ahead of them:
the fight for judicial nominees.
Senate Republicans are letting President Obama fill a few important slots in his administration, but they haven’t given an inch where it really counts—on the federal judges who could define his legacy for generations. [...]
That means Obama remains at risk of losing his best chance to influence history after he’s gone.
The judiciary is “every president’s lasting legacy,” says Michael Gerhardt, director of the University of North Carolina Center on Law and Government. Indeed, federal judges, whose rulings shape every area of American life, typically outlast the presidents who appointed them by years, even decades. And in most cases, especially on controversial issues, their legal outlooks over the long term tend to mirror the worldviews of the presidents who picked them.
But Obama might be the exception to the rule. The slow pace of Obama’s nominations to federal trial and appeals courts and Republican resistance to his choices both before and after they are made could reduce the impact of his two terms.
In 2009, when Obama took office, 60 percent of federal judges were appointed by Republicans, 40 percent by Democrats. Obama has closed that gap: Now 51 percent of judges were Democratic appointees. If Obama were keeping pace in nominations, he should reach 58 percent. But he's not, both because he's been slow in making appointments, and because of the complete obstruction from the GOP. They are
refusing to put forward names and to
allow nominations to proceed even to committee consideration.
There's one court where the Republican advantage is most problematic:
While Obama’s overall numbers are in line with Bush and Clinton on Appeals Court judges, Republicans are giving him a particularly hard time on nominations to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. There’s no mystery why: It is often a springboard to the Supreme Court and its workload encompasses a broad sweep of federal agencies and issues, including the Environmental Protection Agency, the National Security Agency, the National Labor Relations Board, the constitutionality of Obama’s recess appointments, and executive power in general. [...] All four active GOP appointees are under age 70, compared with only two of four named by Democrats. Of the six senior appointees who still hear cases, one is a Democrat age 73 and five are Republicans ages 67 to 78. Democratic retirements after 2016 could well be filled by a GOP president.
Last month, Obama nominated three people as a package to fill the remaining vacancies, and Republicans immediately reacted by introducing legislation to reduce the number of seats on that court. These nominations are going to come up in the fall, after August recess and while the Congress is also dealing with the budget and with the debt limit. There will be real incentive for Obama and Senate Democrats to backburner these nominations—and the fight that's going to come with them—to not poison the well during the budget debate. That would be a real mistake, for the judiciary, for the country, and for Obama's legacy. For years to come.
Help us finish the job. Sign our petition with Senator Jeff Merkley to ask that the U.S. Senate reinstate the talking filibuster.