Trump nominates four new US attorneys

Trump nominates four new US attorneys https://t.co/IcglKDWsmx pic.twitter.com/mVFkJVnCqK

— Washington Examiner (@dcexaminer) November 19, 2017

White House officials have moved quickly to find candidates for vacant U.S. attorney slots across the U.S., with more than 50 nominations since the president removed dozens of Obama-appointed U.S. attorneys in March.

Trump's Biggest Success in Office

Trump's Biggest Success in Office https://t.co/wqXyzS3mDV via @rameshponnuru

— National Review (@NRO) November 16, 2017

While you were focused on COMEY, Trump nominated another group of CONSERVATIVE Judges

Just spoke on CNN pointing out GOP agenda is moving forward: 14 CRA repeals of Obama regulations, FCC, FDA chairmen, SCOTUS pick, taxes next

— Grover Norquist (@GroverNorquist) June 10, 2017

While you were focused on COMEY, Trump nominated another group of CONSERVATIVE Judges https://t.co/uT1Rx7Ax9s pic.twitter.com/LarHeXiNht

— Legal Insurrection (@LegInsurrection) June 8, 2017

Here come Trump’s judges: President to put forward more strong judicial nominees

[Jonathan H. Adler] Here come Trump’s judges: President to put forward more strong judicial nominees https://t.co/WidXQnJkp8 pic.twitter.com/qi1B8Go79s

— Volokh Conspiracy (@VolokhC) May 8, 2017

Monday, according to Adam Liptak in the New York Times, Trump will announce 10 more judicial nominees to lower courts. The nominees make up an impressive list of highly respected jurists, attorneys and legal thinkers. Those of us who doubted Trump would take judicial nominations seriously may have some crow to eat. Especially when one looks at the names to be announced for appellate court vacancies, this is as strong a list of nominees as one could hope for....

Trump’s other appellate nominees are equally impressive: attorneys Kevin Newsom for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, John Bush for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit and perhaps most notably Notre Dame law professor Amy Coney Barrett for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit.

Newsom clerked for Supreme Court Justice David Souter, served as the solicitor general of Alabama and wrote a well-regarded article for the Yale Law Journal, “Setting Incorporationism Straight: A Reinterpretation of the Slaughter-House Cases.”

Barrett clerked for Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, served for six years on the Advisory Committee for the Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure and has an impressive scholarly record.

Bush is an accomplished litigator and president of the Louisville Lawyers’ Chapter of the Federalist Society. He served on the Sixth Circuit’s Advisory Committee on Rules from 2012 to 2015.

In addition to the appellate nominees noted above, Trump is poised to nominate Damien Schiff of the Pacific Legal Foundation to the U.S. Court of Federal Claims. Among other things, Schiff successfully argued Sackett v. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency before the U.S. Supreme Court. Trump will also name several district court nominees....

McConnell gambit on federal judges begins to pay off https://t.co/lJwi5YJMD0 pic.twitter.com/vdDmHs4X4R

— Roll Call (@rollcall) May 9, 2017

"What President Trump can do on Day One to reform America's legal system"

"What President Trump can do on Day One to reform America's legal system" https://t.co/AdKNZGHgQ7 pic.twitter.com/n6IW8ImQWC

— Washington Examiner (@dcexaminer) December 28, 2016

The Washington Post estimates that Trump will inherit 103 vacancies, and the federal court system estimates 127 using a slightly different methodology that includes announced vacancies.

The "but judges" argument for Trump will be quickly put to the test https://t.co/fbvv1WSJq4 pic.twitter.com/ejN0ijrKmL

— Washington Examiner (@dcexaminer) December 27, 2016

...The federal court system is already dominated by Democratic presidents' appointments. Russell Wheeler of the Brookings Institution estimated last month that Democratic appointees currently hold 51 percent of the 673 district court judgeships, with Republicans holding only 34 percent and the remainder being vacant. In the next four years, 216 district court judges (the majority of them Republican appointees) will be eligible to take retirement or senior status.

On the appeals court level, Trump will have an immediate opportunity to appoint 17 judges to vacancies among the 179 circuit court judgeships. Based on Wheeler's estimates, Democratic appointees currently comprise 51 percent of circuit court judges, with Republican appointees holding 40 percent and the vacancies accounting for the rest....

Many conservatives who reluctantly voted for Trump did so on the promise that he might turn the nation's courts in a more conservative direction. The current Supreme Court vacancy is just one part of that fight — given that the high court only hears so many cases, the overall composition of the lower courts is nearly as important. They will not have to wait too long to see whether Trump's word was good — or at least whether he will leave it to the conservatives in his administration to bring him the names for his appointments.