	Introduction

Under the Appointments Clause of the Constitution, the President and the Senate share responsibility for making appointments to the Supreme Court, as well as to various lower courts of the federal judiciary. While the President nominates persons to fill federal judgeships, the appointment of each nominee also requires Senate confirmation. In recent decades, however, appointments to two kinds of lower federal courts—the U.S. circuit courts of appeals and the U.S. district courts—have often been the focus of heightened Senate interest and debate, as has the process itself for appointing judges to these courts. Given congressional interest in the subject, this report provides statistics and analysis related to the nomination and confirmation of U.S. circuit and district court judges from 1977 (the beginning of the Carter presidency) through 2018 (the second year of the Trump presidency). Time from Nomination to Confirmation

This section provides, for nominees confirmed by the Senate from 1977 through 2018, the median number of days from nomination to confirmation by presidency and by Congress. The first two years of the Trump presidency, with a median of 140.5 days, represent a decline in this trend. Frequency of Roll Call Votes for Confirmed Nominees

The Senate may confirm nominations by unanimous consent, voice vote, or by recorded roll call vote. During the first two years of the Trump presidency, all U.S. circuit court nominees were confirmed using roll call votes, representing an increase from recent years in the frequency of using roll call votes to confirm circuit court nominees. These particular demographic characteristics of judicial nominees are of ongoing interest to Congress.
In recent decades, the process for appointing judges to the U.S. circuit courts of appeals and the U.S. district courts has been of continuing Senate interest. The President and the Senate share responsibility for making these appointments. Pursuant to the Constitution's Appointments Clause, the President nominates persons to fill federal judgeships, with the appointment of each nominee also requiring Senate confirmation. Although not mentioned in the Constitution, an important role is also played midway in the appointment process by the Senate Judiciary Committee.
The statistics presented in this report reflect congressional interest in issues related to the confirmation process for lower federal court nominees. Statistics are provided for each stage of the nomination and confirmation process—from the frequency of judicial vacancies that require a presidential nomination for a judgeship to be filled to the frequency of roll call votes (rather than the use of unanimous consent or voice votes) to confirm judicial nominees. Statistics are also provided related to the length of the confirmation process itself. Additional statistics provided relate to the demographic characteristics of circuit and district court nominees confirmed by the Senate.
The period covered by the report, 1977 through 2018, includes every Administration from the Carter presidency to the first two years of the Trump presidency. This period also includes every Congress from the 95th (1977-1978) through the 115th (2017-2018).
Because the statistics presented for the Trump presidency are for the first two years of his Administration (while statistics for other presidencies reflect each President's entire Administration, whether four or eight years), the statistics presented for the Trump presidency may be different at the conclusion of his Administration.
This report will be next updated by CRS at the conclusion of the 116th Congress.