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</div><div>“The latest of President Trump’s confirmed federal judges has been assailed by fellow lawyers for her lack of trial experience and has been lambasted by reproductive rights advocates for her vigorous opposition to abortion, surrogacy and in vitro fertilization,” reported The Washington Post. Sarah Pitlyk is the latest Trump nominee to receive a “not qualified” rating from the American Bar Association.</div><div>
</div><div>In a Sept. 24 letter to lawmakers, William Hubbard, chair of the ABA’s Standing Committee on the Federal Judiciary, wrote that Pitlyk’s “experience to date has a very substantial gap, namely the absence of any trial or even real litigation experience.”</div><div>
</div><div>“Ms. Pitlyk has never tried a case as lead or co-counsel, whether civil or criminal,” Hubbard wrote. “She has never examined a witness. Though Ms. Pitlyk has argued one case in a court of appeals, she has not taken a deposition. She has not argued any motion in a state or federal trial court. She has never picked a jury. She has never participated at any stage of a criminal matter.”</div><div>
</div><div>Pitlyk, whose experience seems limited to clerking for Brett Kavanaugh, is 42 years old. She will probably be handing down rulings that could have been lifted from the Breitbart comments section for several decades.</div><div>
</div><div>One in five federal judges have now been selected by Donald Trump.</div></div><div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">=</font></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><a href="https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2019/11/5/1897399/-Moscow-Mitch-and-Trump-campaign-on-packing-the-judiciary-with-unqualified-ideologues" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2019/11/5/1897399/-Moscow-Mitch-and-Trump-campaign-on-packing-the-judiciary-with-unqualified-ideologues</font></a></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p style="margin: 0px 0px 10px; box-sizing: border-box; letter-spacing: 0.125px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"> Election Day in Kentucky, where Moscow Mitch McConnell and Donald Trump <a href="https://www.rollcall.com/news/whitehouse/trump-in-kentucky-reelect-pain-in-the-ass-gop-governor-as-2020-message" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box; background-color: transparent;">teamed up</a> to help a guy they both loathe and call a "pain in the ass," Matt Bevin, retain the governorship. But it was as much about McConnell's reelection as Bevin's, since this election is going to bleed straight into the next one, when it's McConnell's Senate seat on the line. Trump made sure to do some stumping for McConnell during the Bevin rally they appeared at Monday, telling the crowd McConnell "works smarter" than others in Washington, while detailing all of McConnell’s supposed accomplishments during Trump's administration. (That would be the massive tax cut scam and appointing unqualified, partisan judges, as well as obstructing the House Democrats' agenda to actually accomplish things that help people.)</font></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 10px; box-sizing: border-box; letter-spacing: 0.125px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In that vein, McConnell stumped for himself, touting having gotten so many Trump judges into office. "My motto is 'leave no vacancy behind,'" he bragged. Never mind that the nominees he's been pushing through have less than stellar qualifications. In fact, since 1989 only 21 judicial nominees have been rated unqualified by the American Bar Association. More than one-quarter of them were nominated by Trump in the last three years—eight of them, in fact. Just ponder that for a bit. President Obama didn't nominate a single unqualified judge, but Trump has had eight in just three years. It took George W. Bush two terms to pick the nine unqualified candidates he racked up.</font></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 10px; box-sizing: border-box; letter-spacing: 0.125px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">McConnell has pushed through five of them so far, and there are another two on deck—the <a href="https://www.dailykos.com/story/2019/10/31/1896344/--Aarrogant-lazy-ideologue-Trump-nominee-cries-crocodile-tears-in-confirmation-hearing" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box;">"arrogant, lazy ideologue"</a> Lawrence VanDyke, who cried crocodile tears over his ABA rating, and <span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">anti-abortion zealot <a href="https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/10/pitlyk-is-trumps-latest-unqualified-judicial-nominee.html" title="" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none; box-sizing: border-box;">Sarah Pitlyk</a>, who "has never tried a case as lead or co-counsel, whether civil or criminal [and] has never examined a witness," as the ABA's committee unanimously pointed out in rating her unqualified.</span></font></p><p style="margin: 0px 0px 10px; box-sizing: border-box; letter-spacing: 0.125px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The Senate Majority Leader is infesting the federal judiciary with unqualified, bigoted judges. And he’s doing it for Trump, a bigoted, unqualified president. Because it wasn't enough to destroy the Senate.</font></p></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"></font></div></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></div><div><a href="https://www.alternet.org/2019/12/one-in-five-federal-judges-now-a-trump-appointee-imperiling-progressive-change-for-as-long-as-we-live/"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">https://www.alternet.org/2019/12/one-in-five-federal-judges-now-a-trump-appointee-imperiling-progressive-change-for-as-long-as-we-live/</font></a></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">no lnx</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>One in five federal judges now a Trump appointee — Imperiling progressive change ‘for as long as we live’</b></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Written by Jake Johnson / Common Dreams December 6, 2019</font></div><div>
</div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell rammed through eight of President Donald Trump’s lifetime judicial picks in just three days this week, accelerating the far-right court takeover that one commentator warned is “absolutely going to hamstring efforts to make the U.S. into a responsible, civilized country, for as long as we live.”</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>The latest slew of confirmations, according to Bloomberg‘s Sahil Kapur, means that Trump and his Federalist Society allies have now hand-picked “about one in every five American federal judges,” or 170 judges total.</b></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“Nearly all are in their 40s or 50s with lifetime appointments and positioned to shape American law for generations,” Kapur noted on Twitter. “It gets a tiny fraction of attention compared to other stuff he does but this is the Trump legacy that’ll echo for generations after he’s gone.”</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">This is absolutely going to hamstring efforts to make the US into a responsible, civilized country, for as long as we live. And all I’ve heard any liberal do is point to it and lament. Is there any remedy on the table, even theoretically? https://t.co/8DtDd9xYzb</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">— David Roberts (@drvox) December 5, 2019</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The Republican-controlled Senate confirmed one lifetime judicial nominee Tuesday, five Wednesday, and two Thursday. The rapid confirmation of Trump nominees was made possible by McConnell’s decision earlier this year to invoke the so-called “nuclear option,” which slashed debate time on judicial nominees from 30 hours to just two.</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“We’re appalled,” the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights tweeted Thursday in response to the latest confirmations.</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Progressive advocacy groups and legal experts have warned that these right-wing judges will have the power to shape U.S. law on climate, reproductive rights, and other major areas for decades to come. At a rally in Kentucky last month, McConnell bragged that he and Trump are “changing the federal courts forever.”</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>In addition to being overwhelmingly young and far-right, a number of Trump’s judicial appointments have also received a “not qualified” rating from the American Bar Association. One such judge, Federalist Society member Sarah Pitlyk, was condemned as particularly horrifying by rights groups following her confirmation Wednesday.</b></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“Sarah Pitlyk’s confirmation to the district court in Missouri is a dream come true for the anti-choice movement and a profound danger to women and families in the state,” Ilyse Hogue, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America, said in a statement. “Putting judges like Pitlyk on the bench who will spend their lifetime appointments working to roll back reproductive freedom is further proof that Donald Trump is paying back his debts and then some to the anti-choice movement that got him elected.”</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In the face of the ongoing right-wing takeover of the federal judiciary, advocacy groups are pressuring 2020 Democratic presidential candidates to explain how they would work to reform the nation’s court system in order to enact progressive policy changes.</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“Without a meaningful plan for court reform any presidential attempts to make needed change will simply by blocked by the courts,” said Emma Janger, co-director of the People’s Parity Project, a nationwide network of progressive attorneys and law students.</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">As Common Dreams reported in October, advocacy group Demand Justice launched a campaign urging Democratic presidential contenders to emphasize the importance of the federal courts and tell the public how they plan to break the right’s stranglehold on the judiciary.</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“The GOP has hijacked our nation’s courts,” said Demand Justice, “and voters need to hear plans to fight back.”</font></div></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
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