Shabaz Joins Randa in Going Senior Status

Written by Daniel on October 10, 2007 – 12:17 pm -

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U.S. District Court Judge John Shabaz of the Western District of Wisconsin released a letter to President Bush today requesting that he appoint a successor, and that as long as the successor is confirmed before Bush leaves office, Shabaz will move to senior status.

Judge Shabaz, a reliable conservative known for his “rocket docket,” served as a Republican leader in the state Assembly before his appointment to the federal bench in 1982 by President Reagan.

The other judge on the Western District is Judge Crabb, generally considered a liberal who was appointed by President Carter in 1979. In other words, this will be the first vacancy in the Western District in over 25 years.

Pursuant to the agreement of Senators Kohl and Feingold, the two senators and Rep. Sensenbrenner will now cooperate with the State Bar of Wisconsin to appoint a commission to interview and recommend potential replacements. We saw this process most recently in action with the senior-status request of Judge Rudy Randa of the Eastern District earlier this year. The Randa commission announced its six candidates in September, approximately three months after Randa’s letter. We are still waiting on the Senators to do interviews and then the names go to the White House, who picks the final nominee, who then goes to the US Senate for confirmation. The Shabaz commission will be chaired by the Dean of the University of Wisconsin Law School and include a bipartisan panel.

I am not as familiar with things in the Western District as in my own Eastern District, but we here at GOP3.com will again endeavor to lead the state in news and analysis on the replacement race as this story develops.

See the Cap Times story and resignation letter.

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