Last Week In Congress: How Cascadia’s U.S. lawmakers voted (September 6th-9th)

Good morn­ing! Here’s how Cascadia’s Unit­ed States Sen­a­tors vot­ed on major issues dur­ing the leg­isla­tive week end­ing Fri­day, Sep­tem­ber 9th, 2022.

The House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives was in recess.

In the United States Senate

JOHN LEE, APPEALS COURT JUDGE: The Sen­ate on Sep­tem­ber 7th con­firmed the nom­i­na­tion of John Z. Lee to be a judge on the U.S. Sev­enth Cir­cuit Court of Appeals. Lee, a judge on the U.S. Dis­trict Court for the North­ern Dis­trict of Illi­nois since 2012,was pre­vi­ous­ly a pri­vate prac­tice lawyer in Chica­go and, in the ear­ly 1990s, a Jus­tice Depart­ment lawyer. A sup­port­er, Sen­a­tor Dick Durbin, D‑Illinois, said of Lee: “Dur­ing his time on the bench, he always applied the law to the facts before him in an even­hand­ed and fair fashion.”

The vote was 50 yeas to 44 nays.

	Vot­ing Nay (2): Repub­li­can Sen­a­tors Jim Risch and Mike Crapo
	Vot­ing Aye (2): Demo­c­ra­t­ic Sen­a­tors Ron Wyden and Jeff Merkley
	Vot­ing Aye (2): Demo­c­ra­t­ic Sen­a­tors Maria Cantwell and Pat­ty Murray

Cas­ca­dia total: 4 aye votes, 2 nay votes

ANDRE MATHIS, APPEALS COURT JUDGE: The Sen­ate on Sep­tem­ber 8th con­firmed the nom­i­na­tion of Andre Math­is to be a judge on the U.S. Sixth Cir­cuit Court of Appeals. Math­is has been a pri­vate prac­tice lawyer in Mem­phis, Tenn., since 2007. A sup­port­er, Sen­a­tor Dick Durbin, D‑Illinois, called Math­is “a per­son of out­stand­ing cre­den­tials and integri­ty to serve the com­mu­ni­ty that raised him.”

The vote was 48 yeas to 47 nays.

	Vot­ing Nay (2): Repub­li­can Sen­a­tors Jim Risch and Mike Crapo
	Vot­ing Aye (2): Demo­c­ra­t­ic Sen­a­tors Ron Wyden and Jeff Merkley
	Vot­ing Aye (2): Demo­c­ra­t­ic Sen­a­tors Maria Cantwell and Pat­ty Murray

Cas­ca­dia total: 4 aye votes, 2 nay votes

Key votes ahead

The House will recon­vene on Tues­day after a month-long break that was inter­rupt­ed by a vote to pass the Infla­tion Reduc­tion Act. Bills being tak­en up include Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Suzan Del­Bene’s Improv­ing Seniors’ Time­ly Access to Care Act of 2021, the Whistle­blow­er Pro­tec­tion Improve­ment Act of 2021, the Ensur­ing a Fair and Accu­rate Cen­sus Act, and the Pre­vent­ing a Patron­age Sys­tem Act of 2021. Major­i­ty Leader Ste­ny Hoy­er’s office also advised mem­bers that there could be a vote on an appro­pri­a­tions bill for Fis­cal Year 2023.

The Sen­ate is slat­ed to con­tin­ue work­ing on judi­cial nom­i­na­tions. The next nom­i­nee to be con­sid­ered will be a Wash­ing­ton­ian: Sal­vador Men­doza, Jr., who was nom­i­nat­ed to be a Unit­ed States Cir­cuit Judge for the Ninth Cir­cuit. (The Ninth Cir­cuit includes the entire greater Pacif­ic North­west: Wash­ing­ton, Ore­gon, Ida­ho, Mon­tana, and Alas­ka, plus Cal­i­for­nia, Hawaii, Ari­zona, and Nevada.)

The Sen­ate will also move towards con­fir­ma­tion votes on two oth­er appel­late nom­i­nees: Ari­an­na J. Free­man from Penn­syl­va­nia to be Unit­ed States Cir­cuit Judge for the Third Cir­cuit and Lara E. Mon­te­cal­vo from Rhode Island to be Unit­ed States Cir­cuit Judge for the First Cir­cuit. There are a total of 179 judge­ships in the fed­er­al appel­late sys­tem, spread over eleven circuits.

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