The Senate on Thursday managed to confirm along a mostly party line vote another of President Donald Trump’s judicial nominees. The Senate confirmed Kasdin Miller Mitchell,Trump’s nominee to serve as a federal district judge in Texas, adding another lifetime appointment to the federal judiciary during Trump’s second term. Mitchell was confirmed 49-45 to serve on the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas. The Senate had earlier voted 49-47 to advance her nomination by invoking cloture. Trump nominated Mitchell in May to fill the seat previously held by Judge Barbara M. Lynn, who retired. The Senate Judiciary Committee advanced her nomination in July on an 11-10 vote. Mitchell is a litigation partner at the Dallas office of Kirkland & Ellis and has handled complex trial and appellate cases. She previously clerked for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and Judge William H. Pryor Jr. of the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Mitchell also worked as an assistant solicitor general for Alabama. Before attending law school, Mitchell worked in the George W. Bush administration, including as an assistant press secretary to first lady Laura Bush and in the Department of Energy. She earned both her undergraduate degree and law degree from Yale University. While at Yale Law School, she worked on the Yale Law Journal and Yale Law & Policy Review. Mitchell has also been involved in litigation concerning constitutional issues, including gun rights. Reuters reported that she worked on *New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen*, the landmark 2022 Supreme Court case that expanded protections for carrying firearms in public. Her confirmation gives Trump another appointee on the Northern District of Texas, a federal court system covering much of northern and western Texas, including Dallas and Fort Worth. According to Reuters, Mitchell became Trump’s 55th confirmed judicial nominee since he returned to office in January 2025. Trump appointed 234 federal judges during his first term. The Northern District of Texas now has seven Trump appointees among its 10 active judges, according to Reuters. The court has handled a number of nationally significant challenges to federal policies in recent years. Mitchell’s confirmation came as Senate Republicans continued processing judicial nominations before lawmakers leave Washington for the final stretch of the 2026 midterm campaign. Following the Mitchell vote, Senate Majority Leader John Thune filed cloture on the nomination of Angela Veronica Colmenero to become a district judge for the Southern District of Texas, setting up another potential confirmation vote. Federal district judges serve lifetime appointments under Article III of the Constitution, subject to resignation, retirement or removal through impeachment. Meanwhile, Trump’s nominee for U.S. Surgeon General is already facing a bit of controversy ahead of her Senate confirmation hearings. Dr. Nicole Saphier, an oncologist and now-former Fox News contributor, last week disclosed investments in a wide range of tobacco, food, beverage, and pharmaceutical companies, holdings she has agreed to sell or reduce if confirmed by the Senate. Saphier reported investments in Philip Morris International, McDonald’s, Monster Beverage, Coca-Cola, and other major corporations in financial disclosures released Thursday, according to Bloomberg Law. Her portfolio also includes stakes in some of the world’s largest pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, including Eli Lilly, Merck, Johnson & Johnson, Amgen, and Gilead Sciences. The disclosures attracted particular attention because the Surgeon General serves as one of the federal government’s most visible public-health officials and has historically played a major role in communicating the dangers associated with tobacco use, unhealthy diets, and other health risks. Saphier’s ethics agreement calls for her to divest completely or partially from numerous companies whose business interests could potentially overlap with issues she would confront as Surgeon General. Other reported holdings include Pfizer, AstraZeneca, AbbVie, and Biogen, among a much longer list of health-care and biotechnology companies.
The Senate on Thursday managed to confirm along a mostly party line vote another of President Donald Trump’s judicial nominees.
The Senate confirmed Kasdin Miller Mitchell,Trump’s nominee to serve as a federal district judge in Texas, adding another lifetime appointment to the federal judiciary during Trump’s second term.
Mitchell was confirmed 49-45 to serve on the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas. The Senate had earlier voted 49-47 to advance her nomination by invoking cloture.
Trump nominated Mitchell in May to fill the seat previously held by Judge Barbara M. Lynn, who retired. The Senate Judiciary Committee advanced her nomination in July on an 11-10 vote.
Mitchell is a litigation partner at the Dallas office of Kirkland & Ellis and has handled complex trial and appellate cases.
She previously clerked for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and Judge William H. Pryor Jr. of the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Mitchell also worked as an assistant solicitor general for Alabama.
Before attending law school, Mitchell worked in the George W. Bush administration, including as an assistant press secretary to first lady Laura Bush and in the Department of Energy.
She earned both her undergraduate degree and law degree from Yale University. While at Yale Law School, she worked on the Yale Law Journal and Yale Law & Policy Review.
Mitchell has also been involved in litigation concerning constitutional issues, including gun rights. Reuters reported that she worked on New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen, the landmark 2022 Supreme Court case that expanded protections for carrying firearms in public.
Her confirmation gives Trump another appointee on the Northern District of Texas, a federal court system covering much of northern and western Texas, including Dallas and Fort Worth.
According to Reuters, Mitchell became Trump’s 55th confirmed judicial nominee since he returned to office in January 2025. Trump appointed 234 federal judges during his first term.
The Northern District of Texas now has seven Trump appointees among its 10 active judges, according to Reuters. The court has handled a number of nationally significant challenges to federal policies in recent years.
Mitchell’s confirmation came as Senate Republicans continued processing judicial nominations before lawmakers leave Washington for the final stretch of the 2026 midterm campaign.
Following the Mitchell vote, Senate Majority Leader John Thune filed cloture on the nomination of Angela Veronica Colmenero to become a district judge for the Southern District of Texas, setting up another potential confirmation vote.
Federal district judges serve lifetime appointments under Article III of the Constitution, subject to resignation, retirement or removal through impeachment.
Meanwhile, Trump’s nominee for U.S. Surgeon General is already facing a bit of controversy ahead of her Senate confirmation hearings.
Dr. Nicole Saphier, an oncologist and now-former Fox News contributor, last week disclosed investments in a wide range of tobacco, food, beverage, and pharmaceutical companies, holdings she has agreed to sell or reduce if confirmed by the Senate.
Saphier reported investments in Philip Morris International, McDonald’s, Monster Beverage, Coca-Cola, and other major corporations in financial disclosures released Thursday, according to Bloomberg Law.
Her portfolio also includes stakes in some of the world’s largest pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, including Eli Lilly, Merck, Johnson & Johnson, Amgen, and Gilead Sciences.
The disclosures attracted particular attention because the Surgeon General serves as one of the federal government’s most visible public-health officials and has historically played a major role in communicating the dangers associated with tobacco use, unhealthy diets, and other health risks.
Saphier’s ethics agreement calls for her to divest completely or partially from numerous companies whose business interests could potentially overlap with issues she would confront as Surgeon General.
Other reported holdings include Pfizer, AstraZeneca, AbbVie, and Biogen, among a much longer list of health-care and biotechnology companies.
Letitia 'No One's Above the Law' James Just Got Sued And You Won't Stop Clapping
Letitia ‘No One’s Above the Law’ James Just Got Sued And You Won’t Stop Clapping
New York Attorney General Letitia James loves to sermonize that “No one is above the law,” but her record shows she really means “No one named Trump is above my political agenda.” Her entire campaign was a single-issue crusade built on the promise to “Get Trump,” and she delivered by filing a bizarre, victimless “fraud” case against him that even the banks involved openly rejected. Not one financial institution claimed harm. Not one lender said they wouldn’t do business with him again.
But that didn’t stop Judge Arthur Engoron—whose bias was obvious from the bench—from imposing an eye-watering, politically convenient fine of nearly half a billion dollars. It was so grotesquely disproportionate that an appeals court finally tossed it in August, delivering a much-needed reality check to James’s lawfare spectacle.
That’s Letitia James in a nutshell—always pushing the ethical limits, always using the weight of her office to intimidate anyone she marks as a political foe. Bullying isn’t an unfortunate byproduct of her approach; it is her approach.
So it’s hardly shocking that a school board chair in New York is now suing the attorney general, accusing James of threatening to oust board members who refused to bow to the progressive orthodoxy on allowing biological men into women’s sports:
The alleged threats came in a “guidance letter” [from James] that warned of the removal of any school board member who uses the wrong pronoun for a trans person, or if they allow students to publicly speak out at school board meetings about their fears and discomfort with student trans athletes using the wrong locker room for their biological sex.
A plaintiff in the suit, Massapequa Union Free School District Board Chair Kerry Wachter, alleged she was told that James’ office instructed her to mute and dismiss any board meeting speaker that expressed views opposing trans athletes in girls’ locker rooms and sports.
Massapequa Union Free School District Board Chair Kerry Wachter, alleged she was told that James' office instructed her to mute and dismiss any board meeting speaker that expressed views opposing trans athletes in girls' locker rooms and sports.
Wachter says James’ intimidation tactics are designed to intimidate her and others into silence:
“They’re saying if we allow this discussion in our board meetings, she can come in and remove us from the board,” Wachter told Fox News Digital. “They want me to stop public comment and stop them from speaking.”
Wachter added that trans students were not being directly named in any board meetings, and conversations were only based around the feelings and concerns of female students.
James claimed that school board members can be removed when “they willfully neglect their duty or violate legal protections for students in their districts.” She went on to add that the state’s Dignity for All Students Act (DASA) bars harassment and bullying.
Nevertheless, Attorney Kim Hermann from the Southeastern Legal Foundation has a note for James – There is an important constitutional principle known as the First Amendment.
“The First Amendment here reigns true, and so whether or not you have these state laws, a state cannot come in and just erase the First Amendment out of the Constitution,” Hermann said, per Fox News. “Whether or not statements and discussions about transgender and these different policies actually violate those state laws is absolutely irrelevant for what we’re talking about in this lawsuit.
James has shown time and again that she’s not an impartial public servant but a partisan enforcer, eager to weaponize her office against anyone who lands on her enemies list. She doesn’t just stretch her authority — she twists it into a political bludgeon.
If there’s any justice left in New York, this lawsuit will stick and finally force some accountability. Frankly, it’s long past time someone pushed back.
