First posted on Instagram
Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley is pushing Senate Republicans to confirm as many of President Donald Trump's remaining judicial nominees as possible before Democrats take control of the chamber in January, warning that the window to act is closing fast.
Grassley made the case in a Wall Street Journal op-ed published on Tuesday, November 10, 2026, titled "The GOP's Narrow Window to Confirm Judges," writing that "Senate Republicans can safeguard our nation's founding principles for generations to come by confirming President Trump's remaining judicial nominees to lifetime appointments on the federal bench."
The same day the op-ed appeared, the Judiciary Committee advanced four of the President's district-court nominees to the full Senate. Kyle Reardon of Alaska cleared the panel by a 16-6 vote, with four Democrats joining Republicans, while Daniel Ballou of the Eastern District of Kentucky, Richard Bennett of the Southern District of Texas and Courtney Coker of the Northern District of Texas each advanced on party-line 12-10 votes.
About 23 judicial nominees remain pending in the Senate, but only three are on the floor and ready for a confirmation vote. Grassley has scheduled two nomination hearings within eight days this month — on November 10 and November 18 — a break from the committee's usual practice of holding such hearings once every two weeks, to move the remaining nominees faster. The Senate has only about 30 days in session left before the new Congress convenes, with the chamber sitting the week of November 16 and then the three weeks from November 30 through December 18.
The urgency comes from the November 3 midterm elections, in which Democrats swept to a Senate majority that takes effect on January 3, 2027. Democrats are projected to hold at least 54 of the 100 seats. Incoming Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer has said Democrats will prevent the President from installing a "right-winger" on the courts, and the incoming Democratic chairman of the Judiciary Committee has called for a "hard reset on the nominations process."
So far in his second term, 56 of Mr. Trump's judicial nominees have been confirmed to lifetime posts, on top of the 234 confirmed in his first term. The Instagram post puts the comparison at 56 confirmed so far this term against 84 at the same point in his first term. Grassley wrote in the op-ed that by year's end Mr. Trump will have confirmed more than 300 lifetime judges across his two terms, and that he will have shepherded about half of them as Judiciary chairman.
"I'm going to work hard to get judges confirmed quickly during the lame duck session while we still have time," Grassley said. The committee's top Democrat, Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, has accused Republicans of cutting corners to push the nominees through after the midterm defeat. A White House official said the administration expects every pending judicial nominee to be confirmed this year.