The promised
Senate showdown over judicial nominees slated for this afternoon
is not going to happen.
Senate leaders have reached an agreement on judicial nominations, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said Wednesday.
The deal will avert cloture votes Reid was threatening to force on 17 district court nominations, McConnell said.
A Senate Democratic aide provides some details of the deal: They have agreed to bring up 14 of the 17 judges by May 7, hoping to vote on an average of two per week. Twelve of the nominations are to district courts, two to circuit courts. The full list of 22 judges waiting for confirmation votes is
here.
The 12 district court nominations who will get votes in the next few weeks are: Gina Marie Groh, of West Virginia; David Nuffer, of Utah; Michael Walter Fitzgerald, of California; Ronnie Abrams, of New York; Rudolph Contreras, of Virginia; Miranda Du, of Nevada; Susie Morgan, of Louisiana; Gregg Jeffrey Costa, of Texas; David Campos Guaderrama, of Texas; Brian C. Wimes, of Missouri; Kristine Gerhard Baker, of Arkansas; John Z. Lee, of Illinois. The two circuit judge nominees who will get votes are Stephanie Thacker to the 4th Circuit, and Jacqueline Nguyen to the 9th Circuit.
The individual judges will not be subject to cloture votes, while each of the 17 who were to have been considered today, before the deal, would have been. So the fight over confirmations is put off for many more days, but it'll still be a fight. Because that's what Republicans do. Take Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) who was ready to vote against Magistrate David Nuffer, a nominee from his home state whom he supports, out of pique at Democrats.
Meanwhile, the Senate will move on to the small business "jobs" bill that the House passed last week.