By LINDSAY WHITEHURST (Associated Press)
WASHINGTON (AP) — Federal courts moved on Tuesday to make it more difficult to bring lawsuits in front of judges considered supportive of a particular viewpoint, a practice called judge shopping that received national focus in a significant abortion medication case.
The new policy applies to civil suits that would impact an entire state or country. It would mandate a judge to be assigned randomly, even in areas where locally filed cases have previously gone before a single judge.
Cases are currently assigned randomly in most of the country's 94 federal district courts, but some plans assign cases to judges in the smaller division where the case is filed. In divisions with only one judge, often in rural areas, this allows private or state attorneys to essentially choose which judge will hear it.
This approach has raised concerns from senators and the Biden administration, and its use in patent cases was emphasized by Chief Justice John Roberts in his 2021 report on the federal judiciary.
Interest groups of all types have long sought to file lawsuits before judges they view as sympathetic to their causes. However, the practice received more attention after an unprecedented ruling halting approval of abortion medication. This case was filed in Amarillo, Texas, where it was almost certain to go before U.S. District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, an appointee of former President Donald Trump who is a former attorney for a religious liberty legal group with a long history of advocating conservative causes.
The Supreme Court has put the abortion medication ruling on hold and will be considering arguments on it later this month.
The new policy announced by the U.S. Judicial Conference after its biennial meeting would not apply to cases seeking only local action. It was adopted not in response to any one case but rather a “plethora of national and statewide injunctions,” said Judge Jeff Sutton, chief judge of the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals and chair of the Judicial Conference’s executive committee.
“We understand the concept of having local cases resolved locally, but when a case is a declaratory judgment action or national injunction, obviously the stakes of the case go beyond that small town,” he said.
