Congress is back from its August recess, and Biden's judicial nominees up for confirmation by the Senate are as bad as ever. Last week, the Senate Judiciary Committee met to consider several nominees. Of particular concern to Committee Republicans were Richard Federico, nominated to the Tenth Circuit, and Eumi Lee, nominated to the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.
Missouri Senator Josh Hawley grilled Federico on a case where he advocated for a sentence as defense counsel well below the recommended guidlines for a case involving child sexual abuse material. The Daily Wire reported:
Hawley began by laying out the details of the case he was referring to, noting that the sentencing guidelines recommended up to 240 months — or 20 years — in prison. The recommended range, he said, was from 210 months to 240 — but Federico had asked for just 105 months. . .
“So what would you say to the victims in this case, who — let’s just review — and I’m not going to read the specifics because it’s too revolting, but let me just — here — this is from the pre-sentence report,” Hawley continued.
“‘This particular defendant’ — this is sanitized, but it’s still unpleasant — ‘the defendant used multiple mediums to access, obtain, and distribute depictions of child rape, bondage, and sexual exploitation,'” Hawley read. “‘He used dating websites to meet people offering children for sex. He used email to send depictions of child sexual exploitation to his cohorts.'”
In an exchange with Senator Hawley, Federico had a difficult time explaining his recommendations:
Another day, another soft on crime judge from Joe Biden. This should be easy - people who exploit children should be in prison for as long as possible, not coddled with lenient sentences pic.twitter.com/U29Dw2RZIc
— Josh Hawley (@HawleyMO) September 6, 2023
Louisiana Senator John Kennedy focussed his time on Lee who previously wrote a law review article condemning classification of prisoners by biological attributes rather than gender identity. When asked to address his concerns over the article, Lee gave a disingenuous explanation of her role in writing the article.
Eumi Lee's law-review article contradicts her testimony that she was just summarizing the views of panelists. 2/ pic.twitter.com/AUuo1EqOp0
— Ed Whelan (@EdWhelanEPPC) September 8, 2023
The Biden Administration continues to nominate problematic nominee after nominee to the federal bench. Advocating against just punishment for society's most heinous crimes and willingness to give dishonest testimony should be disqualifying to any nominee that comes before the Senate.