Trump begins effort to name judges
Associated Press
WASHINGTON — The Trump administration will name nearly a dozen federal judges as nominees for key posts Monday as President Donald Trump works to pack the nation’s federal courts with more conservative voices. White House press secretary Sean Spicer said among the candidates are individuals previously named on Mr. Trump’s list of 21 possible picks for Supreme Court justice, which was compiled with the help of the conservative Federalist Society and the Heritage Foundation.
Mr. Trump will nominate Joan Larsen, a former clerk to the deceased high-court Justice Antonin Scalia who currently serves on Michigan’s Supreme Court, to the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati, and David Stras, a a justice on the Minnesota Supreme Court bench who clerked for top-court Justice Clarence Thomas, to the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals in St. Louis. Mr. Spicer said another eight nominees would be named later Monday. The announcement comes less than a month after Mr. Trump’s final pick for the Supreme Court, Neil Gorsuch, was confirmed as justice to the nation’s highest court.
Justice Larsen is a rising star in conservative legal circles. She served in President George W. Bush’s Justice Department.
Among the others expected to be named are Amy Barrett, a law professor at the University of Notre Dame and former Scalia law clerk, to the Chicago-based 7th Circuit; John Bush, an attorney in Louisville, Ky., to the 6th Circuit; and Kevin Newsom, an attorney in Birmingham, Ala., and a former clerk to retired Supreme Court Justice David Souter, to the Atlanta-based 11th Circuit.
Mr. Trump has made one federal appeals court nomination, selecting federal district Judge Amul Thapar for a seat on the 6th Circuit.
Health care fight
After Republican leaders finally pushed their health care bill through the House last week, no one expects a new bill to be written quickly, but Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., has started a process for producing one.
Mr. McConnell has created a 13-man working group on health care, including staunch conservatives and ardent foes of the Affordable Care Act — but no women.
At the same time, the American Action Network — a political nonprofit aligned with Republican House Speaker Paul Ryan — launched an ad thanking supporters of House health care bill, while the health advocacy group Save My Care announced an advertising campaign targeting 24 Republican House members who voted to repeal Obamacare.
Religious liberty order
Many in the LGBT community are reading between the lines in what was viewed as a harmless Trump executive order last week on religious liberty — and now they are concerned it could restrict hard-fought rights.
Notably: a provision that directs Attorney General Jeff Sessions to issue guidance to federal agencies “interpreting religious liberty protections in federal law,” which activists say could be used to shield federal employees who refuse to process veterans or Social Security benefits for same-sex spouses — or their children.
Thorny visa program
The top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee said Monday that Congress should end a contentious “citizenship-for-sale” visa program in order to eliminate a potential conflict of interest for Jared Kushner, Mr. Trump’s son-in-law and a White House adviser.
The comments from Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California came in response to media reports that Kushner Companies representatives — including Mr. Kushner’s sister, Nicole Meyer — marketed use of the EB-5 investor visa program to Chinese nationals at a conference in Beijing over the weekend.