the vacancy on the u.s. supreme court may be the most talked-about empty seat in the federal judiciary, but dozens more await donald trump and his white house throughout the lower courts, including the all-important federal courts of appeal. president barack obama tipped the balance of the appeals courts in favor of democrats in his two terms, tapping a group of judges who are likely to be protective of his programs and policies. whether mr. trump can restore a republican advantage will depend on how quickly he can start up the machinery for selecting and vetting judicial nominees and how much time the senate is willing to yield to the process. republican-appointed judges held majorities on nine of the 12 regional appeals courts when mr. obama entered office. he will leave office having created majorities of democratic-appointed judges on eight of the 12, according to sara schiavoni, a professor at john carroll university who studies judicial politics and selection. mr. trump, who has promised to appoint judges in the mold of the late supreme court justice antonin scalia, will enter office with at least 16 vacancies on the federal courts of appeals, the last stop for the vast majority of federal cases. many more could open during his administration, as judges consider whether to take a form of semiretirement called senior status. forty-eight federal appellate judges became eligible for senior status during mr. obama<u+2019>s two terms and could step down from full-time work or resign at any time, according to russell wheeler, a fellow at the brookings institution who studies federal courts. they don<u+2019>t have to, however. judicial appointments are for life, and at least 25 full-time appellate judges who plan to be on the bench for the start of mr. trump<u+2019>s presidency have been eligible for senior status since mr. obama entered office. researchers have found that veteran judges are more likely to step down when the party of the president who appointed them regains the executive branch.<u+200b> another 25 appeals-court judges will become eligible for semiretirement from 2017 to mid-2020, mr. wheeler said. the federal trial courts have 81 vacancies, an unusually high number driven by republicans<u+2019> control of the senate in mr. obama<u+2019>s final two years. a dozen more trial-court vacancies are expected soon, according to the administrative office of the u.s. courts. democrats<u+2019> change of senate rules also could backfire on them. until 2013, the minority party could often use procedure to delay judicial nominees it opposed, by keeping debate on the nominees open until the majority could come up with 60 votes. a republican blockade of mr. obama<u+2019>s nominations in 2013 prompted democrats to require only a simple majority of senators, instead of 60, to cut off debate on nominees to the lower courts. the filibuster can still be used to oppose supreme court nominees. republicans will likely have a 52-48 majority in at least the first two years of mr. trump<u+2019>s administration. democrats still have some levers to pull in the senate if they object to a lower-court nominee. when a president makes a judicial nomination, the senate judiciary committee sends a form known as a <u+201c>blue slip<u+201d> to the senators from the nominee<u+2019>s home state. if both senators return the slips, the chairman of the committee typically moves the nominee forward. if one or both withholds them, tradition dictates that the nomination languish. sen. chuck grassley (r., iowa), chairman of the senate judiciary committee, will continue to honor the blue-slip process, said taylor foy, a committee spokesman. democrats expect the tradition of deferring to home-state senators on judicial nominees to continue, and both parties will use the vetting and hearing process <u+201c>to ensure that qualified, mainstream, nonpartisan judges are put on the bench,<u+201d> a senior democratic aide said. fifty-nine judicial nominees sent to the senate by mr. obama still await a vote. any still pending by the close of the current congress in december would become mr. trump<u+2019>s to fill. the supreme court vacancy is likely to monopolize judge-vetting resources early on in mr. trump<u+2019>s term, possibly slowing lower-court nominations, said ms. schiavoni. the white house and justice department collaborate on selecting and vetting potential nominees, a process that can take months for each, and republican legislative priorities may take precedent over personnel issues, ms. schiavoni pointed out. <u+201c>there is not going to be an instantaneous impact on the lower courts,<u+201d> ms. schiavoni said. <u+201c>it<u+2019>s going to be years before they can even make a dent in the vacancies.<u+201d> write to joe palazzolo at joe.palazzolo@wsj.com
donald trump looks to put his stamp on federal courts  - wsj
joe palazzolo