Trump nominates Ludwig for federal court judge
U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Brett Ludwig was named by President Donald Trump to fill a long-vacant seat on Milwaukee’s federal district court.
Ludwig was among four names recommended to the White House in December by Wisconsin Sens. Tammy Baldwin and Ron Johnson after a bipartisan federal nominating commission had screened applicants.
If confirmed by the U.S. Senate, Ludwig would replace Rudolph Randa, who took senior status in 2016, and died later that year.
One of Ludwig’s law clerks said Wednesday he would not speak with a reporter and had no comments about his nomination.
Until his appointment to bankruptcy court in February 2017, Ludwig was a partner at Foley & Lardner. He is a graduate of University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point and the University of Minnesota Law School.
The others recommended to Trump in December were Joseph Bugni, who manages the Madison office of Federal Public Defender Services of Wisconsin, Samuel Hall Jr., managing partner at the Crivello Carlson law firm, and Daniel Vaccaro, a partner at Michael Best &
Friedrich.
Earlier in 2019, Trump’s own lawyers had bypassed the traditional bipartisan judicial nominating commission and found their own list of potential judges. Bugni and Hall were on that list, too.
Baldwin informed the White House she would not support any of those names, then, because they had not been a product of the traditional selection process.
Trump’s first try at filling Randa’s spot on Milwaukee’s federal court didn’t work out either. Late in 2017, he nominated one of Randa’s former law clerks, Gordon Giampietro, for the job. His name had also come through the joint nominating commission.
Then reports surfaced about his 2014 radio interview comments highly critical of legalizing same-sex marriage and comments he made on a Catholic blog equating “calls for diversity” with relaxed moral and ethical standards.
Baldwin felt Giampietro had not fully disclosed all his comments and writings during the vetting process and withdrew her support. He never got a hearing before the Senate judiciary committee and Trump let his nomination expire at the end of 2018.
U.S. District Court judges get lifetime appointments. The job pays $208,000 a year.