08.01.24

Senate Unanimously Passes Bipartisan Bill To Authorize Dozens of New District Court Judgeships

WASHINGTON – U.S. Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin, Chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, today celebrated unanimous Senate passage of the Judicial Understaffing Delays Getting Emergencies Solved (JUDGES) Act, which would authorize 63 new permanent district court judgeships and three new temporary district court judgeships. The bill now heads to the House of Representatives for consideration. In June, the JUDGES Act advanced out of the Senate Judiciary Committee on a 20-0 vote.

“As dockets become overburdened, it’s important that Congress uses its authority to ensure the federal judiciary can efficiently consider pending cases. These new district court judgeships will help alleviate the caseloads for overburdened districts and help make the justice system accessible to all. I commend Senators Young and Coons for working in a bipartisan manner to address these judicial emergencies. I hope their work will be rewarded with swift passage by the House,” said Durbin.

Despite growing caseloads, Congress has not created a new district court judgeship since 2003 nor enacted comprehensive judgeship legislation since 1990. In March 2023, the Judicial Conference of the United States, a nonpartisan policymaking body for federal courts, recommended that Congress create 66 new district court judgeships to help alleviate overburdened dockets.

The bipartisan legislation is based on the Judicial Conference’s recommendations and sponsored by U.S. Senators Chris Coons (D-DE), Todd Young (R-IN), James Lankford (R-OK), and Alex Padilla (D-CA). The new judgeships would be created over a ten-year period, allowing for effective response to the federal judiciary’s needs without giving an advantage to one party or president.

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