Robin Rosenbaum Confirmed to Eleventh Circuit

Robin Rosenbaum was confirmed as a circuit judge yesterday (May 12, 2014) in a 91-0 vote.  Circuit Judge Rosenbaum is quite young at 47 years old and will be the youngest judge currently serving on the Eleventh Circuit.  She previously served as a U.S. District Court Judge in the Southern District of Florida (she was appointed to that post by President Obama).

 

She also was a magistrate judge and federal prosecutor in the Southern District of Florida. Before that, she served in the DOJ, worked as an associate for Holland & Knight, and clerked for Circuit Judge Stanley Marcus.

 

Her appointment continues the general re-shaping of the Eleventh Circuit under President Obama.  He has now appointed three judges to that court, and if, as expected, Jill Pryor and Judge Julie Carnes are appointed, he will have made five appointments .  This will mean that five of the Court’s twelve authorized judges were appointed by President Obama, and that eight of the Court’s twelve authorized judges were appointed by Democratic presidents.

 

There is still a vacant Alabama seat to which no nominee has been announced. I am doubtful this seat will be filled before the 2014 elections.

 

I expect that Judge Rosenbaum’s appointment will shift the Court’s center of gravity a little further to the left (remember that Judge Martin was also an uncontroversial former district judge who has turned out to be exceptionally liberal on the circuit court’s bench).  Along with Judge Jordan and Martin, and Judge Wilson, four of the court’s nine active judges will be solidly on the court’s liberal wing. 

 

This means that, at least for the time-being, the moderate Judge Marcus will be the “swing” vote on contentious issues between the Court’s new liberal wing, and the older conservative wing (Tjoflat, Carnes, Hull, and Pryor).

 

The change in jurisprudence in the Eleventh Circuit may not be as dramatic as that witnessed in the Fourth Circuit, which has shifted from a conservative-dominated court, to a liberal court under President Obama, but change is coming to the Eleventh!