Jul. 11—The Senate Judiciary Committee voted Thursday in favor of confirming Portland attorney Stacey Neumann as a U.S. District Court judge in Maine.
The committee vote puts Neumann on track to be confirmed for the position by the full Senate, which will likely happen by the end of the month before the Senate breaks for the summer in August.
Neumann, who was nominated by President Biden in April, is a partner at Murray Plumb & Murray in Portland. Before joining the firm in 2013, she worked as a federal prosecutor for the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Maine and as a defense attorney in Vermont.
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Neumann’s nomination was approved in a 13-8 committee vote without discussion, with all 11 Democrats on the committee joined by Republicans Sen. Lindsey Graham and Sen. Thom Tillis in supporting her nomination.
Carl Tobias, law professor at the University of Richmond and a close follower of the judiciary committee, said that the bipartisan vote for Neumann is significant, as the committee is usually starkly divided along party lines.
“Judicial selection is inherently politicized, because federal judges enjoy life tenure and issue rulings that affect people’s lives in critically important ways,” Tobias said in an email. “The Senate is almost evenly divided (51-49) now and so is the Senate Judiciary Committee (11 Dems v. 10 GOP), so there is potential for close … confirmation votes. There also is a long history of fights over judges, which seems to only be getting worse.”
Neumann would fill the position of U.S. District Judge Jon Levy, who announced last year he would retire this past May.
Superior Court Justice Julia Lipez, a Maine judge whom Biden nominated to join the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Boston, also was scheduled to be voted on Thursday by the judiciary committee, but the Republican minority postponed that vote.
“It has nothing to do with her candidacy,” Tobias said, noting that when a nominee is on the agenda for the first time, it is “automatic” for the minority to postpone the vote. Tobias said Lipez’s nomination should be discussed at the next judiciary committee meeting, which is scheduled for July 25.
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