A.G. Gancarski
Attorney General Ashley Moody blasted President Joe Biden as being “tone deaf” for appointing criminal defense attorneys to judgeships.
With violent crime on the rise, Moody finds it “incredible” that public defenders would be given the gavel.
“You just had President Biden, just now, this morning, brag on national television in a speech that he has appointed more criminal defense attorneys to the bench than any other administration in history. As we’re seeing a crime surge in murder and violent crime across the nation. They’re tone deaf,” Moody said on Friday’s episode of the Faulkner Focus on the Fox News Channel.
“He thinks it’s a good thing that he’s putting criminal defense attorneys on the bench while our murder rates are surging,” Moody added. “It’s incredible.”
While Moody may find it incredible that Biden is appointing defense attorneys, it seems to be part of the administration’s commitment to diversifying the judiciary.
Biden has nominated 53 women, 20 African Americans, 15 Hispanics and 13 Asian American Pacific Islander candidates thus far, CNN reported. In addition to 21 public defenders, 16 civil rights lawyers and five labor lawyers have also been nominated.
It’s not just liberals who want more diversity in the judiciary.
The libertarian-leaning Cato Institute this year offered an unambiguous argument.
“We need more public defenders and civil rights lawyers as judges,” the group said.
By and large, most judges are former prosecutors, the writers note.
“Former prosecutors outnumber former defense lawyers by a ratio of 4‑to‑1, with those representing government in criminal or civil proceedings outnumbering those litigating against the government by a ratio of 7‑to‑1,” contended authors Clark Neily and Devi Rao.
Former President Donald Trump “only made this imbalance worse, appointing 12 times more judges who had worked exclusively as government advocates than judges with backgrounds in criminal defense or plaintiff‐side civil rights litigation,” the authors added.
7 comments
PeterH
December 17, 2021 at 2:04 pm
After reading Ashley’s radical resume ….I’m pretty sure most thinking Americans would believe that Moody’s impartiality is just a bit fractured:
“ During her tenure as Florida attorney general, Moody has supported lawsuits to invalidate the Affordable Care Act, advocated against restoration of voting rights for former felons, and opposed the legalization of recreational marijuana. Moody was a significant surrogate of then-President Donald Trump in Florida during the 2020 presidential election, and joined in the Texas v. Pennsylvania lawsuit, which sought to overturn the results of the election.”
Florida and DeSantis can find them!
Alex
December 17, 2021 at 2:59 pm
Ashley Moody claims….
is where I stopped reading.
I won’t waste my time on her stupidity.
lass
December 18, 2021 at 8:08 am
I don’t recall Ashley endorsing “I like beer” as a judicial qualification. Why can’t she just STFU, at least for the holidays? She can knit a “Trump Won” halter top, perhaps
Charlotte Greenbarg
December 18, 2021 at 6:36 pm
More panic posting from the Democrats who are on a slide to defeat!
PeterH
December 18, 2021 at 7:28 pm
Magical thinking alert!
Chuck Hudson
December 18, 2021 at 8:11 pm
The clear implication of Moody’s asinine statement seems to suggest lawyers who have represented criminal defendants can not be trusted to uphold the oath required of judicial nominees. That denigrates a large segment of the American bar and strikes me as a violation of most state Bar rules, especially the Florida rules. This wannabe Marjorie Green needs to be called to task by the legal profession, not only in Florida, but throughout the country.
Mike Collins
December 19, 2021 at 8:09 am
When I was a young lawyer, I was both a county prosecutor and a criminal defense lawyer. Both roles have equally important roles to play in our adversarial system — and neither side has a monopoly on the skills and temperament needed for the bench. Attorney General Moody’s remarks reflect poorly on her appreciation of the legal profession and the criminal justice system.
Comments are closed.