An upcoming vacancy on the U.S. District Court in Colorado has led both of the state’s U.S. senators to establish their own search committees for the next federal judge.
The move comes after the announcement that Judge Robert Blackburn will move to senior status on April 22, 2016. Blackburn has been serving as a Colorado federal district court judge since 2002.
In August, Sen. Cory Gardner, R-Colo., announced the formation of a Judicial Evaluation Committee comprised of 11 Colorado legal experts to help select qualified nominees for the upcoming vacancy. Sen. Michael Bennet, D-Colo., announced the formation of his own Bipartisan Selection Advisory Committee at the end of October.
While Bennet’s committee is continuing to accept applications from potential candidates until Nov. 23, Gardner’s committee recently announced that it had recommended four legal professionals as potential nominees to fill the upcoming vacancy.
“I appreciate the hard work done by the Judicial Evaluation Committee,” Gardner said in a statement on Tuesday. “They devoted countless hours to carefully reviewing applicants and interviewing finalists in order to ensure that Colorado has the most qualified legal mind possible on the federal bench. I look forward to reviewing their recommendations and making progress towards filling this vacancy.”
While it’s not uncommon for senators from different political parties to establish their own committees, the tradition is for the senior senator – in this case Bennet – to establish a judicial search committee when an upcoming vacancy is announced, and then for the junior senator to work alongside him or her in selecting a final nominee. Federal court vacancies are generally announced a year in advance in order to expedite the selection and confirmation process.
In 2009 and 2012, then-senior Sen. Mark Udall, D-Colo., worked alongside Bennet to establish bipartisan committees to streamline the selection process for nominees to the U.S. District Court.
“We will consider Senator Gardner’s recommendations, and we look forward to choosing from a great pool of candidates,” said Bennet spokesman Philip Clelland. “Senator Bennet’s committee is currently accepting applications, and we are eager to see who else applies.”
The selection process could ultimately lead to the committees selecting different nominees. Under the standard process, home state senators send their short list of nominees to the president, who then chooses the final nominee to go through the Senate confirmation process.
Because of the current political climate in Congress, coupled with the overworked caseload of Colorado’s U.S. District Court, a non-unity nominee could lead to a delay in filling the upcoming vacancy. According to the U.S. Courts, there are currently 54 U.S. District Court vacancies and 23 nominees pending before the Senate Judiciary Committee or the full Senate.
Colorado’s U.S. District Court currently has seven judges, a number that has not increased in 30 years. If an appointment is not made by the time of Blackburn’s move to senior status, the state’s court system could become further bogged down with cases.
But Melissa Hart, director of the Byron R. White Center for the Study of Constitutional Law at the University of Colorado Law School, said that the two search committees probably wouldn’t cause any issues with selecting a final candidate.
“My understanding is that many, if not all, of the people that applied to Gardner’s committee are applying to Bennet’s committee as well, so it will effectively turn into two interviews instead of one,” Hart said. “We have a very tight-knit legal community in Colorado, so we have a very collegial process. I don’t think this is as unusual as people have made it out to be; it’s just unusual in recent years for Colorado.”
Hart also pointed to the number of current federal court vacancies and pending nominations and said that Gardner’s committee could potentially overcome any political gridlock if it were to reach a consensus with Bennet.
“I don’t think anyone will get through with opposition from Bennet,” Hart said. “But if Gardner recommends one of the people that the commission recommended to him, then I can see members of his party seeing it as an independent endorsement they can agree with.”
egraham@durangherald.com. Edward Graham is a student at American University in Washington, D.C., and an intern for The Durango Herald.
