Democrats will face headwinds in final push to confirm Biden judges
CNN
The first vote the lame-duck Senate will take as it returns Tuesday will be on a nominee for a Chicago federal court, kicking off Democrats’ uphill campaign to confirm as many of President Joe Biden’s picks for the judiciary as possible before losing power at the end of next month.
The first vote the lame-duck Senate will take as it returns Tuesday will be on a nominee for a Chicago federal court, kicking off Democrats’ uphill campaign to confirm as many of President Joe Biden’s picks for the judiciary as possible before losing power at the end of next month. By the time Biden leaves office, he will not be able to fully counter the makeover of the Supreme Court and of federal appeals courts that President-elect Donald Trump achieved during his first term. He could, however, come close to or even eclipse Trump’s numbers on district judges who will be the first line of defense in the legal battles over Trump’s agenda in the next four years. There are 17 judicial nominees who have already been advanced by the Senate Judiciary Committee and are ready for a floor vote. Trump’s return to the White House will only increase the influence he’s had on the federal bench, so every judge confirmed in the lame-duck session will be one less vacancy that he can fill. But holding the White House and Senate majority for another few weeks doesn’t guarantee Democrats will have an easy time processing the final batch of Biden appointees. Many of the pending nominees have been ready for floor votes for months due to unified GOP opposition. And Trump has called on Republicans to blockade the remaining Biden picks, meaning that the White House could need all of the Democratic votes they can get, including from members who are retiring or were defeated last week. “There is a push across the board from the White House and the Senate for Democrats to show up and do the job they were elected to do,” a senior White House official, asking for anonymity to speak candidly, told CNN.
Melania Trump is unlikely to move to Washington full time in her second go-round as first lady, multiple sources told CNN, once more showing signs of her willingness to buck tradition as she returns to her high-profile but unelected role on the world stage.
The reported burglaries took place just prior to and on the day of the Chiefs’ win against the New Orleans Saints on October 7, which aired on “Monday Night Football.”
Four women suing over Idaho’s strict abortion bans told a judge Tuesday how excitement over their pregnancies turned to grief and fear after they learned their fetuses were not likely to survive to birth — and how they had to leave the state to get abortions amid fears that pregnancy complications would put their own health in danger.
President-elect Donald Trump announced Tuesday that Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy will lead a new “Department of Government Efficiency” in his second administration.
President-elect Donald Trump announced Tuesday he has chosen Fox News host Pete Hegseth to serve as his secretary of defense.
A federal judge on Tuesday sentenced a Massachusetts Air National Guard member to 15 years in prison after he pleaded guilty to leaking highly classified military documents about the war in Ukraine.
Murder charges will be filed against at least nine inmates at Litoral Penitentiary in Guayaquil, which has seen riots and massacres in recent years and is widely considered the country’s most dangerous prison.
A large explosion was heard in a Louisville, Kentucky, neighborhood on Tuesday afternoon, sources tell CNN affiliate WLKY News.
Hundreds of Kenyan officers are leading an international force in Haiti, but have not received full pay amid a rocky start in the gang-plagued Caribbean nation.
The Supreme Court declined Tuesday to let Mark Meadows move his Georgia election subversion case to federal court, effectively barring the former chief of staff during Donald Trump’s first term from claiming immunity from those charges.