Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) slammed the Democratic Party’s fixation on “identity politics” for judicial nominees after the Biden administration confirmed its 100th federal judge this week.
McConnell criticized President Joe Biden and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) for emphasizing the race and sexual orientation of judicial candidates in statements marking the milestone the day before.
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“Both the President and the Democratic Leader focused their comments overwhelmingly on identity politics and demographic box-checking,” McConnell said in a floor speech Wednesday. “The president’s statement spent literally one part of one sentence paying lip service to the question of legal qualifications. The remaining five paragraphs were devoted solely to these new judges’ demographic characteristics. It was downright bizarre.”
He continued, “When these Democrats talk about our sacred American legal system, they sound like the H.R. department at some liberal university.”
McConnell said the outward diversity of the judges stands in contrast to their ideological bent, and the minority leader took aim at the criminal defense backgrounds of Biden’s nominees.
“Ironically, when it came to how these new judges actually think, both the president and the Democratic leader went out of their way to celebrate the lack of diversity,” he said. “They bragged about their coordinated and deliberate effort to stuff the judiciary with an unprecedented volume of former criminal defense attorneys.”
In his statement, Biden said 76% of his nominees were women, and 68% were people of color.
“I’m especially proud that the nominees I have put forward — and the Senate has confirmed — represent the diversity that is one of our best assets as a nation and that our shared work has broken so many barriers in just 2 years,” he said.
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The Senate on Tuesday confirmed Gina Mendez-Miro to serve as U.S. district judge for the District of Puerto Rico, Biden’s 100th federal court appointment. Schumer and the president celebrated her status as the first openly LGBT judge on that bench.
Biden has confirmed more judges than former President Donald Trump did at the same time in his term. Trump had 85 judges in place by the two-year mark, compared to Biden’s 100.
