WASHINGTON – The Republican-led Senate easily confirmed President Barack Obama’s pick for a Tennessee federal judgeship on Monday, even as the GOP maintained its blockade against considering Obama’s nominee for the Supreme Court vacancy.
By a 92-0 vote, senators approved Waverly Crenshaw for the lifetime appointment, filling a vacancy in the Middle Tennessee District that officials declared a “judicial emergency” because of the number of cases pending there.
Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., accused Republicans of “a concerted effort to undermine the American judiciary system.” He said they have moved far too slowly on Crenshaw’s and other judicial nominations and, as he’s repeatedly done before, attacked their refusal to consider Merrick Garland for the Supreme Court.
Crenshaw, an attorney in Nashville, Tennessee, was the first judicial nomination the Senate has approved since Justice Antonin Scalia’s Feb. 13 death opened a seat on the high court. Twenty-seven of Obama’s nominees to district courts and five to the appeals court remain in limbo.
Democrats have charged that Republicans have confirmed too few nominees in the last year. Crenshaw was the 17th federal judge the chamber has approved since the GOP took control of the Senate in January 2015.