Latest news with #Hermandorfer
Newsweek
14-07-2025
- Politics
- Newsweek
Whitney Hermandorfer, Trump's First Judicial Pick of Second Term, Approved
Based on facts, either observed and verified firsthand by the reporter, or reported and verified from knowledgeable sources. Newsweek AI is in beta. Translations may contain inaccuracies—please refer to the original content. The Senate has confirmed President Donald Trump's first judicial nominee of his second term, approving Whitney Hermandorfer to serve on the Sixth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The 46–42 vote fell strictly along party lines. Hermandorfer previously served as director of strategic litigation for the Tennessee attorney general, where she defended several of Trump's policies, including efforts to end birthright citizenship and support for the state's near-total abortion ban. Hermandorfer's confirmation underscores Trump's continued effort to shape the federal judiciary, a campaign that defined much of his first term. Under Trump's previous administration, the Republican-controlled Senate confirmed 234 federal judges, including three Supreme Court justices. Democrats responded during President Joe Biden's term by confirming 235 judges of their own — a record that Trump is now seeking to surpass. Whitney Hermandorfer of the Tennessee Attorney General's Office speaks before a panel of judges, April 4, 2024, in Nashville, Tenn. Whitney Hermandorfer of the Tennessee Attorney General's Office speaks before a panel of judges, April 4, 2024, in Nashville, Tenn. Associated Press Unlike the start of his first term, when Trump inherited more than 100 judicial vacancies due to the GOP-led Senate's obstruction during President Barack Obama's final years, he now faces a slimmer number — 49 vacancies out of nearly 900 federal judgeships. Still, Senate Majority Leader John Thune has vowed to press ahead with confirmations, noting that although there are fewer openings this time, the Republican-led Senate will prioritize moving nominees swiftly. Critics of Hermandorfer's nomination have pointed to her limited courtroom experience — she graduated from law school just ten years ago — and what they view as a deeply ideological background. Her record drew sharp criticism from Democrats and progressive legal groups, who labeled her views extreme and pointed to her office's defense of Tennessee's stringent abortion ban. Prior to that role, Hermandorfer clerked for three U.S. Supreme Court justices. At her confirmation hearing, Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.) questioned her qualifications, citing the "striking brevity" of her litigation record. Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), the top Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, accused Trump of valuing personal loyalty and political alignment over judicial independence. The Judiciary Committee is also preparing to vote on additional nominees, including Emil Bove, a senior Justice Department official and former Trump attorney nominated for the Third Circuit. Bove's nomination has drawn scrutiny following allegations from a whistleblower who claimed Bove suggested the administration might need to defy judicial rulings. Bove has denied the accusation and instead criticized the FBI for "insubordination," claiming agents refused to identify those involved in the Capitol riot investigation and that he dismissed prosecutors tied to the Jan. 6 cases. This article includes reporting by the Associated Press.
Politico
14-07-2025
- Politics
- Politico
Senate confirms first new judge of Trump's second term
The Senate has voted to confirm the first judicial nominee of Donald Trump's second term, marking the resumption of the president's longstanding campaign to install a conservative tilt across the federal judiciary. Whitney Hermandorfer was confirmed in a 46-42 vote along party lines to replace an Obama-era appointee on the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals — pushing the court which hears appeals from Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio and Tennessee further to the right. Trump has long indicated he expects a level of enduring loyalty from his picks to the federal bench, calling them 'my judges.' But the Senate vote also follows an aggressive campaign from Trump allies to target existing judges whose rulings have created obstacles to the administration's agenda, culminating in calls for their impeachment. The House never pursued those impeachment resolutions. And efforts to hamstring the power of district court judges — including by limiting their ability to issue injunctions with sweeping, nationwide implications — have also proved fruitless, after the provisions were stripped from Trump's landmark domestic policy bill signed into law earlier this month. In Trump's first term, the vast transformation of the federal judiciary was a marquee accomplishment. He nominated hundreds of judges to the federal bench, buoyed by changes to Senate rules that facilitated their swift confirmation. Now, relatively few seats remain for Trump to fill, after former President Joe Biden also nominated and succeeded in seating hundreds of judges. Official U.S. courts data show roughly 49 existing vacancies. A graduate of Princeton University and George Washington University Law School, Hermandorfer clerked for Supreme Court Justices Samuel Alito and Amy Coney Barrett and then-D.C. Circuit judge Brett Kavanaugh. She has served as director of the Strategic Litigation Unit of the Tennessee Attorney General's office and defended the state's near-total abortion ban along with its prohibition on gender-affirming care for minors. In his announcement of her nomination, Trump called Hermandorfer 'a staunch defender of Girls' and Women's Sports.' Democrats and their allies argued that Hermandorfer, who graduated law school in 2015, lacked the professional experience to hold a lifetime appointment on the powerful appeals court and criticized her work on the frontlines of conservative culture wars. Democratic Senators voted in unison to reject her nomination.
Yahoo
05-06-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
What can we expect from Trump's judicial nominees?
On Wednesday, the Senate Judiciary Committee held its first judicial nominations hearing of President Donald Trump's second term. They heard from Trump's first batch of potential federal judges since he returned to the White House: four nominees to Missouri federal district courts and a nominee to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit, the federal appeals court for Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio and Tennessee. The 6th Circuit nominee, Whitney Hermandorfer, is impressively credentialed. Both the valedictorian of her law school class at George Washington University and the editor-in-chief of the law review, she worked at litigation powerhouse Williams & Connolly in Washington, D.C., where current partners sing her praises. Hermandorfer clerked for four federal judges, including three sitting Supreme Court justices. And after returning to her home state of Tennessee, she has served as the director of strategic litigation at the state attorney general's office. If I were invited to lunch with Hermandorfer, I expect she would be — as she was during Wednesday's hearing — modest, poised, interesting and likable. But her paper trail and some of her exchanges with senators could be ominous signs of the Trump judicial nominees to come. Put aside that Hermandorfer graduated from law school just 10 years ago and served as a law clerk for four of them. Her six years of actual legal practice is roughly half of what the American Bar Association considers necessary to be qualified for a federal judgeship. What's far more troubling is how she has spent that time and what she won't discuss. For example, Hermandorfer signed Tennessee's amicus brief in one of the birthright citizenship cases now before the Supreme Court. Tennessee's brief echoes the Trump administration's primary arguments: First, the citizenship clause does not confer citizenship simply because of a child's 'presence' in the U.S. And second, in any event, an injunction that extends beyond the plaintiffs in a given case and applies nationally is an unlawful exercise of judicial power. When Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., asked Hermandorfer why Tennessee submitted that brief, she said: 'We were not satisfied that all of the information regarding the contemporaneous meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment was being presented to the various courts, given that the litigation was proceeding so quickly.' She elaborated that Tennessee's brief highlighted '1800s-era sources regarding the meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment' and maintained that the state 'did not take an ultimate position with regard to the merits of the executive order,' but instead intended to underscore that it isn't an 'open-and-shut case.' That all sounds fair, right? Yet the brief's first page argues plainly that if the Constitution's citizenship clause is interpreted to focus on 'parental domicile,' or where someone's parents reside, rather than mere presence, Trump's executive order banning birthright citizenship is constitutional. That position is not only antithetical to more than 125 years of American jurisprudence and lived experience, but her response to Durbin also raises questions about her veracity. Hermandorfer's exchange with Sen. Amy Klobuchar about habeas corpus, the legal means by which a prisoner or detainee can seek release, was similarly revealing. The Minnesota Democrat noted White House deputy chief of staff Stephen Miller's recent statement that the Trump administration was 'actively looking at' suspending the writ of habeas corpus, which, according to the Constitution, can be suspended only 'when in Cases of Rebellion or Invasion the public Safety may require it.' Such suspensions are widely understood to require congressional action. As Hermandorfer's ex-boss Justice Barrett and appellate superstar Neal Katyal have jointly written, the relevant constitutional text 'does not specify which branch of government has the authority to suspend the privilege of the writ, but most agree that only Congress can do it.' Klobuchar therefore asked: 'Do you agree that only Congress can suspend the right to habeas corpus?' Hermandorfer wouldn't engage, however, much less acknowledge, that every time the writ has been suspended — even when the suspension ultimately was ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court — Congress was either involved in the decision or ratified it thereafter, as as in Abraham Lincoln's case. Instead, she replied: That is a issue that is under active consideration by the political branches, and could very well come before me if I were confirmed as a judge. So I think, in prudence, as a judicial nominee, it would not be appropriate for me to pass on the validity of any such arguments. Hermandorfer isn't the first judicial nominee to somewhat mischaracterize her prior legal advocacy. Nor is she the first to avoid inconvenient questions. But until this administration, both birthright citizenship and the need for Congress to approve any suspension of habeas were taken as givens across the ideological spectrum. That Whitney Hermandorfer, like Trump himself, considers them viable legal disputes should concern us all. This article was originally published on
Yahoo
04-06-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Trump appellate court nominee defends experience at US Senate hearing
By Nate Raymond (Reuters) -A former clerk to three conservative U.S. Supreme Court justices who was chosen by President Donald Trump to become a federal appeals court judge faced questions from U.S. lawmakers on Wednesday about her youth and her support of the Republican president's order curtailing birthright citizenship. Whitney Hermandorfer, 37, tapped to serve on the Cincinnati-based 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, defended her record at the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee's first hearing on judicial nominees since Trump returned to office in January. "The cases have come fast and furiously, and I've been privileged to handle a number of nationally significant matters," Hermandorfer, a lawyer serving under Tennessee's Republican attorney general, said. The hearing comes as judges in dozens of cases have slowed or blocked some of Trump's initiatives to dramatically expand presidential authority and slash the federal bureaucracy, prompting calls from Trump and his allies for judges to be impeached or accusing them of being part of a "judicial coup." Hermandorfer is the first of Trump's 11 judicial nominees so far to appear before the Republican panel, as the White House looks to further reshape a judiciary whose members have stymied key parts of his agenda. Four nominees to serve as trial court judges in Missouri appeared before the panel later on Wednesday. Trump shifted the ideological balance of the judiciary to the right in his first term with a near-record 234 appointments, including three members of the Supreme Court's 6-3 conservative majority. Hermandorfer clerked for Justices Samuel Alito and Amy Coney Barrett, and clerked for Justice Brett Kavanaugh while he was a judge on a federal appeals court in Washington, D.C. Today, she heads a strategic litigation unit in Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti's office, where she has defended the state's near-total abortion ban and challenged a rule adopted under former Democratic President Joe Biden barring discrimination against transgender students. Republican senators appeared likely to advance her nomination to the full Senate for its consideration, even as Democrats raised questions about the positions she'd taken in court and the 37-year-old's level of experience just a decade out of law school. "I am concerned about the striking brevity of your professional record," Democratic Senator Chris Coons said. He noted that the American Bar Association had long had a standard deeming judicial nominees qualified only if they had at least 12 years of experience. Several Democrats criticized the Trump administration for deciding last week to cut off the legal organization's decades-old ability to vet judicial nominees as part of its ratings process. Republicans welcomed the move, accusing the nonpartisan group of bias against conservatives. Hermandorfer said that while as an appellate lawyer she had never tried a case to a jury verdict, she had litigated over 100 appellate cases and argued four federal appeals. "That sounds like quite a bit of experience," Republican Senator Josh Hawley said. Democratic Senator Dick Durbin, the top Democrat on the committee, questioned Hermandorfer on a recent brief she filed on behalf of the state of Tennessee to the U.S. Supreme Court supporting the Trump administration's bid to let his executive order on birthright citizenship to take effect. Trump's order directed federal agencies to refuse to recognize the citizenship of U.S.-born children who do not have at least one parent who is a citizen or lawful permanent resident. The Supreme Court is weighing whether to narrow nationwide injunctions blocking enforcement of that order that were issued by three judges who concluded it clearly violated the citizenship clause of the U.S. Constitution's 14th Amendment. Hermandorfer told Durbin that her office felt the justices should be provided information about evidence that she said showed that the 14th Amendment as originally interpreted after it was ratified in 1868 called into question whether the constitutionality of Trump's order was an "open and shut case." "I stand by completely those arguments and the historical sources that we advanced to the court," she said.
Hindustan Times
04-06-2025
- General
- Hindustan Times
Trump appellate court nominee defends experience at US Senate hearing
* Whitney Hermandorfer is nominated to 6th Circuit * Democrats question Hermandorfer on her experience, birthright citizenship case * Four Missouri nominees also were considered June 4 - A former clerk to three conservative U.S. Supreme Court justices who was chosen by President Donald Trump to become a federal appeals court judge faced questions from U.S. lawmakers on Wednesday about her youth and her support of the Republican president's order curtailing birthright citizenship. Whitney Hermandorfer, 37, tapped to serve on the Cincinnati-based 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, defended her record at the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee's first hearing on judicial nominees since Trump returned to office in January. "The cases have come fast and furiously, and I've been privileged to handle a number of nationally significant matters," Hermandorfer, a lawyer serving under Tennessee's Republican attorney general, said. The hearing comes as judges in dozens of cases have slowed or blocked some of Trump's initiatives to dramatically expand presidential authority and slash the federal bureaucracy, prompting calls from Trump and his allies for judges to be impeached or accusing them of being part of a "judicial coup." Hermandorfer is the first of Trump's 11 judicial nominees so far to appear before the Republican panel, as the White House looks to further reshape a judiciary whose members have stymied key parts of his agenda. Four nominees to serve as trial court judges in Missouri appeared before the panel later on Wednesday. Trump shifted the ideological balance of the judiciary to the right in his first term with a near-record 234 appointments, including three members of the Supreme Court's 6-3 conservative majority. Hermandorfer clerked for Justices Samuel Alito and Amy Coney Barrett, and clerked for Justice Brett Kavanaugh while he was a judge on a federal appeals court in Washington, D.C. Today, she heads a strategic litigation unit in Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti's office, where she has defended the state's near-total abortion ban and challenged a rule adopted under former Democratic President Joe Biden barring discrimination against transgender students. Republican senators appeared likely to advance her nomination to the full Senate for its consideration, even as Democrats raised questions about the positions she'd taken in court and the 37-year-old's level of experience just a decade out of law school. "I am concerned about the striking brevity of your professional record," Democratic Senator Chris Coons said. He noted that the American Bar Association had long had a standard deeming judicial nominees qualified only if they had at least 12 years of experience. Several Democrats criticized the Trump administration for deciding last week to cut off the legal organization's decades-old ability to vet judicial nominees as part of its ratings process. Republicans welcomed the move, accusing the nonpartisan group of bias against conservatives. Hermandorfer said that while as an appellate lawyer she had never tried a case to a jury verdict, she had litigated over 100 appellate cases and argued four federal appeals. "That sounds like quite a bit of experience," Republican Senator Josh Hawley said. Democratic Senator Dick Durbin, the top Democrat on the committee, questioned Hermandorfer on a recent brief she filed on behalf of the state of Tennessee to the U.S. Supreme Court supporting the Trump administration's bid to let his executive order on birthright citizenship to take effect. Trump's order directed federal agencies to refuse to recognize the citizenship of U.S.-born children who do not have at least one parent who is a citizen or lawful permanent resident. The Supreme Court is weighing whether to narrow nationwide injunctions blocking enforcement of that order that were issued by three judges who concluded it clearly violated the citizenship clause of the U.S. Constitution's 14th Amendment. Hermandorfer told Durbin that her office felt the justices should be provided information about evidence that she said showed that the 14th Amendment as originally interpreted after it was ratified in 1868 called into question whether the constitutionality of Trump's order was an "open and shut case." "I stand by completely those arguments and the historical sources that we advanced to the court," she said.
