News: Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.) is allowing President Donald Trump’s nomination of a federal judge in Pennsylvania to go forward, waiving his right to block the selection.
It’s the first time in Trump’s second term that a Senate Democrat has turned in a blue slip for one of Trump’s judicial picks. The move is already setting off yet another battle between Fetterman and his numerous critics on the left, who demand unyielding opposition to Trump, particularly on lifetime appointments to the federal bench.
This is also a new test for Senate Democrats. Trump only recently nominated a pair of judges for federal district courts in states with one or two Democratic senators. Trump tapped Antonio Pozos for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania and Michael Martin for the Eastern District of Michigan.
Fetterman turned in his blue slip for Pozos to allow the nomination process to move forward, according to a spokesperson for the Pennsylvania Democrat. Michigan’s two Democratic senators haven’t turned in their blue slips for Martin.
Fetterman’s move could take some pressure off Senate Republicans, who defended the blue slip practice when Trump railed against it last year.
Here’s news. A key liberal group, Demand Justice, is planning a six-figure ad buy in Pennsylvania attacking Fetterman for his decision not to veto the Pozos nomination.
They’re also firing off a warning shot for any Senate Democrat who returns a blue slip on a Trump judicial pick, vowing similar six-figure ad campaigns. The group already targeted Fetterman and several other Senate Democrats with a million-dollar ad blitz last year over votes to confirm Trump judges.
Demand Justice argues that all of Trump’s judicial picks refuse to contradict the president’s false claims about winning the 2020 presidential election and the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol, so Democrats need to block every nominee.
“These are not normal times, and any senator who thinks that this is standard operating procedure and that any of these nominations are normal course of operations is deluding themselves,” Demand Justice President Josh Orton told us.
Orton added that “if Democrats truly believe that we have to stand up to Trump’s attacks on the rule of law, they have to do so in every room — not just on Twitter and not just on TV.”
Fetterman and the left. This is the latest instance of Fetterman — once seen as a rising progressive — going up against the left wing of his party.
Fetterman has become one of the most vocal supporters of Israel in Congress, and he’s criticized fellow Democrats as they’ve become more willing to oppose Israel’s war in Gaza. Fetterman has also broken with Democrats to back Trump’s Iran war.
Fetterman helped install Trump Cabinet nominees. And most recently, the Pennsylvania Democrat publicly bashed Graham Platner, Democrats’ Senate candidate in Maine, who has been the subject of a series of scandals.
This has all left Fetterman in a tough spot, even with Democrats from his home state. There’s already talk of primary challenges to the freshman senator in 2028.
