How Trump Is Making the Federal Judiciary Younger, Whiter, and More Republican

This article is part of TPM Cafe, TPM’s home for opinion and news analysis. It was originally published at Balls and Strikes.

With the Senate adjourned until 2026, the book is closed on President Donald Trump’s first-year judicial appointments. How much damage did he do this time around? In my view, a lot—his 26 appointees this year were younger, whiter, and more openly partisan than those he appointed in his first term. 

But if you’re looking for silver linings, it probably could have been worse. In 2017, the first year of Trump’s first term in office, he appointed Justice Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court and 12 judges to the courts of appeals, including the likes of James Ho and future Supreme Court justice Amy Coney Barrett. This year, although Trump appointed more judges overall than he did in 2017, the vast majority were for district court seats—important judgeships, to be sure, but not as powerful as the appeals court seats Trump prioritized in 2017.