Trump taps former Kavanaugh clerk to fill vacancy on powerful D.C. appeals court

[mahatmakanejeeves]

Politics

Trump taps former Kavanaugh clerk to fill vacancy on powerful D.C. appeals court

By Seung Min Kim
April 3, 2020 at 12:41 p.m. EDT

President Trump is tapping a young district judge and former clerk to now-Supreme Court Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh to fill a vacancy on the powerful U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.

The nomination of Justin Walker, 37, is almost certain to trigger a vigorous battle over his qualifications to serve on the nation’s second-most influential court, which is often at the apex of key cases involving executive power and federal regulations. The American Bar Association had deemed Walker not qualified for his current post as judge for the Western District of Kentucky, where he has served for just over five months.

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“I thought it might be a good idea to go outside the Beltway” for the D.C. vacancy, [Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.)] said. “There are plenty of D.C. lawyers that salivate over this job.”

The close ties among McConnell, Kavanaugh and Walker were highlighted last month when the majority leader returned home to Kentucky to attend Walker’s investiture in Louisville as Congress wrestled with a second aid package to combat the effects of the coronavirus pandemic. Both donning the traditional black robe of a judge, Kavanaugh swore in his former clerk, who fervently defended him in the media during his contentious 2018 confirmation fight.

Walker conducted 162 media interviews — including 35 appearances on Fox News, the president’s favored network — defending Kavanaugh and his character, according to the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, which opposed Walker’s nomination to the district court seat last year, citing his ABA rating and “ideological defense” of Kavanaugh.

Walker would fill a vacancy being created by the retirement of Judge Thomas B. Griffith, a George W. Bush appointee who indicated early last month that he will retire in September. Trump has had two picks confirmed to the influential appellate court: Gregory G. Katsas, the president’s former deputy legal counsel, and Neomi Rao, who was Trump’s regulatory czar before her judicial nomination.

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A graduate of Duke University and Harvard Law School, Walker has served as law professor at the University of Louisville since 2015. He is a member of the Federalist Society, a powerful network of conservative lawyers, which has held an outsized influence on Trump’s judiciary strategy and his picks.

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Seung Min Kim
Seung Min Kim is a White House reporter for The Washington Post, covering the Trump administration through the lens of Capitol Hill. Before joining The Washington Post in 2018, she spent more than eight years at Politico, primarily covering the Senate and immigration policy. Follow https://twitter.com/seungminkim

[Walleye]

1. Vengeance is the lifeblood of the republicans

[Phoenix61]

2. This is a really, really bad thing.

He is an evil little shit. The only good thing is he is totally unqualified so if he gets the position it won’t be long before he does something impeachable.

[COLGATE4]

3. The uber-right wing Rethugs continue to

pollute our courts with unqualified Federalist Society hacks.