The United States Senate on Tuesday confirmed the 100th federal judge appointed by Joe Biden who, with diversity as a credo, is trying to dilute the conservative imprint left on the courts by his predecessor Donald Trump.
Gina Mendez-Miro, a 49-year-old jurist, won the support of 54 out of 100 senators and will become a magistrate in the federal court of Puerto Rico.
A specialist in labor law, Hispanic and lesbian, she embodies these new profiles put forward by the Democratic president who, in a press release, said he was "proud" to have promoted candidates "representing diversity" from the United States. .
“76% of confirmed judges under my administration are women and 68% people of color,” he noted, pointing out that he also chose atypical careers with experience in the defense of the poor, for example.
He also brought, for the first time in history, a black woman, Ketanji Brown Jackson, to the Supreme Court.
According to the US Constitution, the president appoints Supreme Court justices and federal magistrates for life. It is then up to the Upper House of Congress to confirm this choice by a vote.
With Democrats in control of the Senate for two years, Joe Biden was able to validate his candidates at an accelerated pace. At this stage of his mandate, Donald Trump had only been able to confirm "only" 85 judges.
Having retained the Senate in the November elections, Joe Biden will be able to continue at this rate until 2024. After Ms. Mendez-Miro, the senators have also confirmed two other of his candidates.
His interest in diversity represents a major shift: in four years, Donald Trump has brought more than 230 judges into federal courts, three-quarters of them men and 85% white people.
His criteria were elsewhere: to please his conservative voters, the Republican had promised to choose magistrates opposed to abortion, defender of the bearing of arms and religious freedoms.
He thus left a lasting mark on the judicial system, the effects of which are particularly felt in the Supreme Court, which has veered sharply to the right since its reshuffle.
In June, the high court, of which he renewed a third of the Elders, dynamited the right to abortion, extended the right to carry a firearm and limited the means of the federal government to fight against global warming.
To reverse the trend, Joe Biden is acting quickly. About fifty judges chosen by him await their confirmation.
To give him room for manoeuvre, several judges of Democratic sensibility have retired or pre-retired. At present, nearly 90 seats, out of the approximately 870 in total, are to be filled.
If he competes with Donald Trump in terms of pace, Joe Biden does not however have the same impact because the Republican had been able to replace judges appointed by Democratic presidents, changing the political coloring of the courts.
During his tenure, three of the thirteen influential federal appeals courts thus went from a majority of judges appointed by Democratic presidents to a majority of magistrates chosen by Republican presidents.
Joe Biden is in the process of "taking back" one, only.
Donald Trump was able to have this impact because the Republicans, who took over the upper house in 2014, blocked a large part of the judges chosen by Barack Obama in the last two years of his mandate.
A hundred positions were therefore to be filled when Donald Trump entered the White House.
These political games have undermined the image of impartiality of American courts and reinforced "judicial shopping", which consists of filing a complaint strategically in a specific court.
The latest example: Abortion opponents have filed a lawsuit against the abortion pill in Amarillo, Texas, where the only federal judge, appointed by Donald Trump, is known for his ultra-conservative views. Their hope? that it ban mifepristone (or RU 486) throughout the United States.
15/02/2023 04:11:04 - Washington (AFP) - © 2023 AFP
