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Judicial vacancies during the Trump administration
President Donald Trump (R) inherited 40 lifetime federal judicial vacancies requiring a presidential nomination when he was inaugurated for his second term on January 20, 2025.[1]Across 890 federal judicial positions, there was an average of 48 vacancies a month from February 2025 to September 1, 2025.[2] Trump inherited about 112 lifetime federal judicial vacancies on January 20, 2017, for his first term. Across 890 federal judicial positions, there was an average of 120 vacancies a month from February 2017 to December 2020.[2][3]
At the time the 115th Congress drew to a close in January 2019, Trump had 85 appointments confirmed by the U.S. Senate: two judges to the Supreme Court of the United States, 30 appellate court judges, and 52 district court judges. Seventy other nominees were returned to him without action, of which 31 were waiting for a vote before the full Senate and 21 were waiting for approval from the Senate Judiciary Committee.[4]
In June 2019, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R) said that his goal was to leave no circuit court vacancies by the end of the 116th Congress. "You know, not many cases make it all the way to the Supreme Court. To put that in context, that’s about one in five of the Courts of Appeals judges nationwide have now been appointed by this president and confirmed by this Senate in two and a half years. And I want you to know that my view is, there will be no vacancies left behind. None," he said.[5]
This page provides an overview of the number of vacancies by month during the Trump administration; the number of nominations and confirmations by month during the Trump administration; historical analysis of the state of the federal judiciary at the start of Trump's term compared to that of his five immediate predecessors; and an analysis of possible judicial openings during the Trump administration.
For monthly updates on vacancies and appointments in the federal judiciary, see the federal judicial vacancy count.
Vacancies by month
The following chart shows the total number of judicial vacancies at the start of each month under the second Trump administration beginning in February 2025. This number comes from vacancies in the U.S. Court of Appeals, U.S. District Courts, U.S. Court of International Trade, U.S. Court of Federal Claims, and the U.S. Supreme Court.[6]
The following chart shows the total number of judicial vacancies at the start of each month under the first Trump administration beginning in February 2017 and ending in December 2020. This number comes from vacancies in the U.S. Court of Appeals, U.S. District Courts, U.S. Court of International Trade, U.S. Court of Federal Claims, and the U.S. Supreme Court.[2]
Nominations and confirmations by month
The following chart shows the number of nominations, confirmations, and ongoing nominations each month during the Trump administration. The numbers come from nominations and confirmations in the U.S. Court of Appeals, U.S. District Courts, U.S. Court of International Trade, and the U.S. Supreme Court. Ongoing nominations is the number of nominees awaiting action in the U.S. Senate.
Historical context
Scope
The scope of the historical analysis presented below is limited to those judicial positions on Article III courts in which confirmed nominees serve a life term. As of 2018, there were 870 of those positions. They include positions on the Supreme Court of the United States, the U.S. Court of International Trade, U.S. courts of appeal, and U.S. district courts. Regarding the district courts, we did not include four federal district judges who serve on U.S. territorial courts, as these district judges serve fixed terms of service.
By definition, a federal judge is a judge serving on any federal court. There is, however, considerable variation in the term length for these federal judges. Some federal judges are appointed for a life term, consistent with Article III of the United States Constitution, but there are other judges on Article III courts who serve a fixed term of office. Some judges serve on courts created under Article I of the Constitution. Some are local judges in Washington, D.C., who are still subject to presidential nomination and confirmation by the U.S. Senate.
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Vacancies
Vacancies at the start of term
Of the last six presidents, Trump was the only one who inherited a vacancy on the U.S. Supreme Court. The last president to do so was James Garfield, who took office in 1881. In January 1881, during the final months of the Hayes administration, President Hayes nominated Stanley Matthews to succeed Justice Noah Haynes Swayne on the Supreme Court. As it was so close to the inauguration of President James Garfield, the Senate took no action on Hayes' nomination; however, in March 1881, President Garfield also nominated Matthews to succeed Justice Swayne. The Senate confirmed Matthews by a vote of 24-23, the smallest margin of any successful Supreme Court nomination in history.
On January 31, 2017, President Trump announced Judge Neil Gorsuch of the United States Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit as his nominee to the U.S. Supreme Court. In addition to the vacancy on the Supreme Court, Trump inherited two vacancies on the U.S. Court of International Trade.
So how did Trump compare with his predecessors on vacancies in the federal circuit and district courts? As the data below shows, Trump had a substantial number of vacancies on these courts to fill. The only president since 1980 with more vacancies at the start of their term was Bill Clinton. Trump's 108 inherited vacancies represent roughly one in every eight life-term judicial positions (12.41%).
Why did President Clinton have so many? On December 1, 1990, the Judicial Improvements Act of 1990 was signed into law by President George H.W. Bush. The act created 85 new federal judicial positions, but faced with an opposition Congress, the first Iraq War in 1991, and a failed re-election bid in 1992, President Bush never got to fill many of these new appointments.[7][8]
The charts below show the vacancy data by both circuit courts and district courts. The data show Trump had the third-highest percentage of circuit court vacancies and the second-highest percentage of district court vacancies among recent incoming administrations.
Vacancies throughout a term
Vacancies occur for a number of reasons. Some judges choose to retire from judicial service entirely without taking senior status, and some judges resign prior to retirement. Others are elevated to a different federal judicial position, which creates a vacancy in the court on which that judge served previously. Some judicial vacancies are created when new positions are designated by statute. Some judges have been impeached and removed from judicial service. Sometimes judges die during the course of their active judicial service.
The most common reason a vacancy is created is when a judge elects to take senior status. When a judge takes senior status—which is a strictly voluntary decision, as a judge cannot be compelled to do so—this creates a vacancy that is filled via a presidential nomination and Senate confirmation. Under the Rule of 80, which is governed by provisions of 28 U.S.C. § 371, beginning at age 65, a judge may retire at his or her current salary or take senior status after performing 15 years of active service as an Article III federal judge.[9] As a judge's age increases until 70 years old, the number of years of service decreases, so long as the age and years of service added together equals 80.[10]
Federal judges are eligible for senior status at the following combined ages and years of service:[9]
The vacancy data below is broken down by year and by court type, looking at district courts (DC), circuit courts (CC), and the two other courts under examination here: the Supreme Court and the Court of International Trade (Other). For every president who served two terms of office, more vacancies occurred during the president's first term than during the president's second term. This data is somewhat misleading for President Reagan, who signed the Bankruptcy Amendments and Federal Judgeship Act of 1984 in July of that year, which was during the final year of his first term. That legislation created 24 new circuit judge positions and 61 new district judge positions.[11]
The charts below categorize vacancies into one of three types: vacancies created by a judge who elects to take senior status, vacancies resulting from a new judicial position created by statute, and a catch-all category (Term) for all other types of judicial vacancies however they may materialize (e.g., resignation, impeachment, or death). The data below showed that when a change of party control of the presidency occurred, every first-term president except for Bill Clinton saw the highest number of circuit judges electing to take senior status in the first year of the first term (Reagan I, G.W. Bush I, Obama I). This first-year trend also held true for district judges electing to take senior status during both George W. Bush's and Barack Obama's first term. If recent trends hold, we would expect that perhaps more judges would elect to take senior status fairly early in Trump's administration than later in the administration.
Possible vacancies in Trump's first term
The data below outlined the possible vacancies that could occur throughout Trump's first term by examining the number of judges eligible for senior status on their respective courts. Senior judges are Article III judges who, having met eligibility through age and service requirements, continue to serve on federal courts while hearing a reduced number of cases. According to the Administrative Office of U.S. Courts, senior judges "typically handle about 15 percent of the federal courts' workload annually."[10] In his 2016 annual report on the federal judiciary, Chief Justice John G. Roberts noted that senior judges "are eligible for retirement with full pay but still continue to work—most in a part-time capacity, but many full-time—without additional compensation."[12] When a judge elects to take senior status—which is a strictly voluntary decision, as a judge cannot be compelled to do so—this creates a vacancy that is filled via a presidential nomination and Senate confirmation. As many as 438 Article III judges in active service at the time of Trump's inauguration became eligible for senior status during Trump's first term; this number represents more than half (50.3%) of the 870 life-term Article III judicial positions existing under law as of 2017. In addition to the 108 Article III vacancies that Trump inherited, another 172 judges became eligible to take senior status by January 20, 2017, and an additional 47 judges became eligible in the 2017 calendar year. Counting existing vacancies and judges who could possibly take senior status, there could have been as many as 438 vacancies by December 31, 2020.[13] Most federal judges who were eligible to take senior status in Trump's first term were appointed by Republican presidents. Most judges appointed to their first federal judicial position by President Barack Obama did not meet the years of service requirement to take senior status during Trump's first term. The charts below indicate how many of the judges who were eligible for senior status during Trump's first term were appointed by Democratic or Republican presidents. That data is broken down by circuit and district courts below. The data show that the majority of both circuit and district judges who could take senior status during the next four years were GOP nominees.
NominationsFirst-year nominationsTrump has noted that filling the vacancy on the U.S. Supreme Court was a priority, but what does the data show about judicial nominations by presidents in their first year? With the exception of President George W. Bush, most recent presidents have made fewer nominations in the first year of their first term than in the first year of their second term. Presidents Reagan, Clinton, and Obama each made fewer nominations in the first year of their first term than in the first year of their second term. President George H.W. Bush only served one term in office, but his first year produced the fewest nominations of all presidents in the first year. This may be because, for the period under scrutiny, President George H.W. Bush did not inherit a presidency in which a change of party affiliation occurred as both Reagan and Bush were Republican. Excluding George W. Bush, the average number of nominations made in the first year of a president's first term is 37.5. Most of these nominations, in turn, have been successful. Again, excluding George W. Bush, most presidents in their first year in office during their first term have very few unsuccessful nominations.[14]
Total appointments by presidentThe following chart shows the total judgeship appointments made by each president from 1901 to 2024.
The following chart shows the judgeship appointments by court made by each president from 1901 to 2024. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit is abbreviated as USCAFC. The U.S. Court of Federal Claims, previously known as the U.S. Court of Claims, is abbreviated USCFC.
The following chart shows the average number of judicial appointments per year in office by presidents from 1901 to 2024.
Noteworthy eventsSenate limits post-cloture debate on presidential nominees, 2019On April 3, 2019, the Senate voted to change the body's precedent and reduce post-cloture debate allowed on executive nominees below the Cabinet-level and federal district court nominees from 30 hours to 2 hours. Two separate votes on executive nominees and judicial nominees passed 51-48. All but two Senate Republicans—Susan Collins (R-Me.) and Mike Lee (R-Ut.)—voted for the changes, while all Senate Democrats who voted opposed the changes. To enact the changes, the Senate used the nuclear option rather than changing its standing rules.[15] Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said his caucus pursued the change due to obstruction by Senate Democrats. He said, "The all-encompassing, systematic nature of this obstruction is not part of the Senate’s important tradition of minority rights. It is a new departure from that tradition. And this break with tradition is hurting the Senate, hamstringing our duly elected president, and denying citizens the government they elected." He also said that many Democrats privately supported the change and would favor it if they controlled the White House.[16] Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) criticized the change, particularly with regard to judicial nominees. He said, “Two hours for a lifetime appointment is unacceptable. Two hours for a lifetime appointment with huge influence on people’s lives is unacceptable. It’s ridiculous.”[15] Senate Democrats also said McConnell pursued similar tactics while in the minority. Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) said, “[McConnell] seems to have completely forgotten the Obama administration. He led the most famous blockade that’s ever happened in the Senate. And that was the blockade of Merrick Garland … it was shameful.”[17] McConnell responded by criticizing Senate Democrats for using the nuclear option to lower the cloture threshold from 60 votes to 51 votes in 2013. He said, “I said at the time I didn’t like the way it was done. And I thought maybe the other side would rue the day they did it. Amazingly enough, about a year and a half later I’m majority leader. Funny how these things change, isn’t it?”[15] DefinitionsNuclear option: The nuclear option, also known as the constitutional option, is a procedure that allows the majority party to change a Senate rule or precedent with a simple majority vote. Normally, the Senate needs a two-thirds vote to invoke cloture on a resolution to change its standing rules.[18] Prior to 2019, the nuclear option was deployed by Senate Majority Harry Reid (D-Nev.) in 2013 to reduce the cloture threshold for presidential nominees other than Supreme Court nominees from 60 votes to 51 votes. In 2017, McConnell used the nuclear option to reduce the cloture threshold for Supreme Court nominees to 51 votes. Read more about the nuclear option here. Cloture: Cloture is a process that allows senators to end debate on legislation, nominations, resolutions, and other business before the body. Before 1917, debate was not limited by Senate rules, which could allow a small number of senators to delay, or filibuster, priorities supported by a majority of senators. After a filibuster in 1917 impacted the country's ability to arm ships during World War One, the Senate amended its rules to allow debate to be shut off by a two-thirds vote of those senators present to vote. Over time, the threshold for invoking cloture was reduced from two-thirds of the body to three-fifths. In 2013 and 2017, cloture was reduced to a simple majority for presidential nominations, but the three-fifths threshold for legislation stayed in effect. As of 2019, time-limited debate was allowed after cloture was invoked, typically giving minority senators the ability to voice their opposition to a measure or nominee before a final passage vote. Read more about cloture here. Ballotpedia analysisOn April 5, 2019, Ballotpedia released an analysis of the changes in debate rules and the possible effects on federal judicial vacancies. To see our full analysis, click here. See also
Footnotes
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