Chris Van Hollen: “we all have State and local governments that have control over their own judicial systems. For example, in my State of…”

“we all have State and local governments that have control over their own judicial systems. For example, in my State of Maryland, we have the Maryland Court of Appeals. We have the lower courts in the State of Maryland. Then, of course, we have the Federal court system. What I am talking about today has nothing to do with the Federal court system. What I am talking about today has to do with judges appointed to the District of Columbia, and because of current law, this Congress oversees those judicial actions. I think we would all agree that, if we were here in the U.S. Senate blocking decisions, nominations made for judges back in our States or our local jurisdictions, that would be a kind of bizarre thing to do. So I want to make it clear that today we are not talking about the Supreme Court of the United States or the U.S. courts of appeals or Federal district court judges. We are talking about the local judges for the people of the District of Columbia, and in that local court system, they have a commission that determines who the nominees are. But the President then nominates the local judges because of the statutes governing the District of Columbia within the U.S. Congress. I have heard on the floor of the Senate, many times, legitimate concerns expressed about crime in the District of Columbia and a backlogged court system in the District of Columbia.…”