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Sentencing Law and Policy
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Getting antsy for US Sentencing Commission appointments after another slate of impressive judicial nominees from Prez Biden

By Douglas Berman

As detailed in this official press release, titled “President Biden Announces Third Slate of Judicial Nominees,” Prez Biden announced a slate of six new judicial appointments ( three new Court of Appeals nominees and three new District Court nominees.  As detailed in this Reuters article, headlined “Biden latest judicial picks stress public defender work,” the new Prez is fulfilling calls to add professional diversity to a federal judiciary now dominated by prosecutors and BigLaw lawyers (see prior posts here and here).  Here are some details:

President Joe Biden on Wednesday announced his latest wave of judicial nominees with six picks who not only reflect his goal of diversifying the federal bench but also include three current or former public defenders for appellate court seats.

The nominees include two attorneys currently with federal public defender offices, Eunice Lee for a seat on the New York-based 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals and Veronica Rossman for a spot with the Denver-based 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

They also include Chief Judge Gustavo Gelpí Jr of the U.S. District Court for the District of Puerto Rico for a spot on the Boston-based 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which hears appeals from three states plus the island territory.  If confirmed, Gelpi, who in the 1990s served as an assistant federal public defender, would be only the second Puerto Rican to serve on the court and would replace the first, Juan Torruella, who died in October.

Progressives and judicial reform proponents have long called for more judges on the federal bench with backgrounds as public defenders. More often, judges have tended former prosecutors or defense attorneys from major law firms.  “President Biden has made clear that the days of public defenders being systematically passed over for top jobs on the federal bench are over,” Christopher Kang, the chief counsel of the progressive group Demand Justice, said in a statement.  He said no president has before nominated so many circuit judges with experience as public defenders. All five of Biden’s nominations so far to the regional circuit courts have had such experience, and three spent the majority of the careers in such positions.

I will be excited to see if and how a group of new federal judges with public defender experience will have a long-term impact on criminal justice jurisprudence coming from the federal courts.  For those interested in short-term reform, however, perhaps it is even more important to see Prez Biden nominate a slate of diverse (and reform-minded) US Sentencing Commissioners. 

Back in February, I wrote a commentary, “Reviving the U.S. Sentencing Commission,” which noted that the USSC has historically been dominated by persons with prosecutorial backgroundsreported in this post, there was seemingly serious talk of serious work on slate of nominees for the Sentencing Commission. 

But it is now mid May, and though Prez Biden has put forward 20 judicial nominations, we have still not yet heard anything more about getting the Sentencing Commission back to work.  So …  color me antsy.

A few prior recent related posts: