President Biden leaves office this month after appointing 235 lawyers to the bench — more than a quarter of all active federal judges.
He named the first Black woman to the U.S. Supreme Court, Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson. He appointed more women of color to federal appeals courts than all previous presidents combined. And he picked a dozen openly LGBTQ judges — and the first four Muslim Americans — to serve on the federal bench.
"For the first time in a long, long time, we have a bench that looks like and represents all of America," he said at a White House event trumpeting his judicial legacy Thursday.
Janai Nelson, president and director-counsel of the Legal Defense Fund, has been closely following judicial selections. She said Biden's approach stands out "as one of his most signature imprints on this country and on our justice system and our democracy."
"It's going to mean that when challenges come before our federal courts, that the American public can have greater faith in the outcome of those decisions, that they were considered by people who reflect a broad range of values and backgrounds," Nelson said.
The Supreme Court — dominated by a conservative supermajority — takes only a tiny fraction of cases each term. That means the lower courts will have the final say on many important controversies.
Loading...
"Every single one of those judges are making important decisions about every aspect of our lives, whether it's who can vote and where we can vote, who has access to health care, who can marry the person they love, who is paid fairly, and so much more," said Lena Zwarensteyn, senior director of the fair courts program and an advisor at the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights.
She said this White House also made a point of stressing professional diversity by advancing civil rights lawyers, labor lawyers and public defenders. Some of those lawyers arrived on the bench directly from such groups as the American Civil Liberties Union, the Brennan Center for Justice, the Center for Reproductive Rights, the Service Employees International Union and the Innocence Project.
"For far too long, the people who were considered to be fair and neutral were white male prosecutors or Big Law attorneys, and we know that that is not right," Zwarensteyn said.
Biden appointed more than 45 former public defenders to lifetime tenured judgeships.
"That is absolutely a lot of people and I think that the power in that is knowing that those voices are sitting in the rooms where the decisions are made," said Zanele Ngubeni, executive director for Gideon's Promise, a group that trains and advocates for public defenders.
Over four years, Biden has appointed one more federal judge than Donald Trump did during his first term in office. Because they serve for life terms, these judges can long outlast the presidents who appoint them. President-elect Trump is expected to take a much different approach to judicial selection than Biden did.
Ed Whelan is a former Justice Department lawyer who now works at the conservative-leaning Ethics and Public Policy Center.
"And I think he'll be looking for the best candidates he can find, of whatever race, ethnicity or gender," Whelan said.
White men made up about two-thirds of Trump's judges during his first term in office.
And he has a ready-made group of dozens of lower court judges to consider if a vacancy arises on the highest court in the land over the next four years.
Copyright 2025 NPR
