How Trump Is Making the Federal Judiciary Younger, Whiter, and More Republican

This article is part of TPM Cafe, TPM’s home for opinion and news analysis. It was originally published at Balls and Strikes. With the Senate adjourned until 2026, the book is closed on President Donald Trump’s first-year judicial appointments. How much damage did he do this time around? In my view, a lot-his 26 appointees this year were younger, whiter, and more openly partisan than those he appointed in his first term. But if you’re looking for silver linings, it probably could have been worse. In 2017, the first year of Trump’s first term in office, he appointed Justice Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court and 12 judges to the courts of appeals, including the likes of James Ho and future Supreme Court justice Amy Coney Barrett. This year, although Trump appointed more judges overall than he did in 2017, the vast majority were for district court seats-important judgeships, to be sure, but not as powerful as the appeals court seats Trump prioritized in 2017. Right now, Trump has fewer than 50 vacancies left to fill, and only one is an appeals court vacancy. Given how slowly new vacancies have arisen since his re-election, Trump may not get many more than that before the 2026 midterm elections, when control of the Senate-and the power to confirm judges-will be up for grabs. Vacancies In the last few weeks, just three district court judges have announced future retirement plans: Western District of Missouri Judge Douglas Harpool, Western District of Arkansas Judge Susan Hickey, and Eastern District of Tennessee Judge Thomas Varlan. Harpool and Hickey were both appointed by President Barack Obama, and Varlan was appointed by President George W. Bush. All sit in states with two Republican senators, which will make appointing their replacements easy. In total, just 30 judges-three appeals court judges and 27 district court judges, 24 Republican appointees and six Democratic appointees-have created vacancies in the nearly 14 months since Trump won re-election. That’s less than half than the approximately 70 judges who left the bench during the same period during the Biden administration. There are 22 Republican-appointed appeals court judges and 39 Republican-appointed district court judges currently eligible to retire, and most of them were already eligible when Trump took office. So far, they’ve decided that allowing a doddering, warmongering fraudster to appoint their replacement is not the judicial legacy they want to leave. As it stands, there are 40 current vacancies, all of which are for district court seats, and 28 of which are in states with two Republican senators. There are nine future vacancies, only one of which is for an appeals court seat. Nominees and Hearings Despite all those vacancies in states with Republican senators, Trump has announced only three new nominees in the last month: Brian Lea to the Western District of Tennessee, Justin Olson to the Southern District of Indiana, and Megan Benton to the Western District of Missouri. All three of them appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee on December 17. If...

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