President Biden Historically Names 40 Black Women As Federal Judges

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President Joe Biden has named 40 Black women to become federal judges, shattering records and creating a new legacy on the bench.

In the final days of his administration, President Joe Biden is following through on one of his campaign promises to make the federal judiciary more diverse, appointing 40 Black women to the bench. That mark was reached when the United States Senate confirmed Tiffany Johnson on Monday (Dec. 9), to replace U.S. District Judge Steve Jones in the Northern District of Georgia.

The appointment means that Biden has named more Black women to the federal judiciary in history, more than the 26 confirmed during the two terms of President Obama. This also includes his nomination of Ketanji Brown-Jackson, the first-ever Black woman named to the Supreme Court. During President Donald Trump’s administration, there were only two Black women who were among the 234 judicial appointees confirmed, making it seven Black people overall. The numbers are highly significant as Trump is making his return to the White House in January, determined to dismantle government agencies such as the Department of Education and the Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division. Having Black women judges means that “there is a different kind of voice that can come from the Black female from the bench,” said John Jay College of Criminal Justice Professor-emeritus Delores Jones-Brown.

Having this many Black judges on the federal level is also highly important due to their “cultural presence” in places such as the South. “There are still courts in the Southern states that still don’t look like … the people they serve because Republican senators have blocked all kinds of diverse nominees, or any nominee from the Democratic president,” said Alliance For Justice Vice President of Communications Carolyn Leary Bobb. The confirmation of Johnson makes her the fifth federal judge in the state of Georgia. 

Among the 40 Black women federal judges, there is also the first openly LGBTQ judge, Melissa R. DuBose, who will serve the U.S. District Court for the District of Rhode Island, and Cristal C. Brisco who will be the first Black judge to serve on the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Indiana. “Those very district court judges are usually the first ones to hear cases, and they hear many, many, many more than our circuit courts,” said legal scholar Lena Zwarensteyn, who noted that even their dissenting opinions carry so much weight.