Patrick Leahy: “Today President Bush is holding a private fundraiser in North Carolina and complaining about the few judicial nominees…”

“Today President Bush is holding a private fundraiser in North Carolina and complaining about the few judicial nominees who have not been given hearings by the Republican-led Senate, when he should be commending the Senate for confirming nearly 200 of his judicial nominees. One-hundred-ninety-eight of his judicial nominees have been confirmed. This number of confirmations is higher than the number of judicial nominees confirmed during President Reagan's first term, during the President's father's Presidency, and during the final term of President Clinton. With these confirmations, there are only 26 vacant seats in the entire Federal judiciary, which is the lowest level since the Reagan administration. Senate Republicans more than doubled circuit court vacancies and raised overall federal court vacancies to more than 100 from 1995 through early 2001. Vacancies have been greatly reduced with Democratic cooperation during the last 4 years. Vacancies have been cut by more than 75 percent and judicial emergency vacancies have been cut by more than 60 percent from what they were.”