Last updated on October 6, 2023
The Senate voted Thursday to end debate on President Joseph R. Biden, Jr.’s nomination of J. Michelle Childs, a South Carolina federal judge, to sit on the powerful U.S. appeals court in the nation’s capital.
A U.S. district judge in Columbia, S.C., Childs was on Biden’s short list to replace now-retired Justice Stephen G. Breyer. That nomination went to Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson.
The 58-33 vote on a Democratic cloture motion means that Childs’ nomination will get a floor vote in coming days. Thirteen Republicans joined the majority Democrats to advance her candidacy.
Biden had previously tapped Childs in Dec. 2021 to replace Judge David S. Tatel on the DC Circuit. Tatel assumed senior status in May after serving as an active appellate judge since 1994.
Childs has been a federal judge since August 2010. She previously served as a state court judge for four years.
During her service on the South Carolina state court bench, Childs sentenced each participant in a conspiracy to commit one of the largest armored truck robberies in the nation’s history to at least 25 years in prison.
As a federal trial court judge, Childs ruled in 2014 – before the Supreme Court held that same-sex marriage is protected by the Constitution – that South Carolina was obligated to recognize a same-sex marriage conducted in Washington, D.C.
Two other Biden nominations to the DC Circuit – U.S. district judge Florence Y. Pan and deputy assistant attorney general Brad Garcia – are also pending in the Senate.
Pan’s nomination was considered by the chamber’s Judiciary Committee on June 22. The committee postponed a vote on her nomination that had been scheduled for Thursday.
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