Earlier this week, former Biden White House counsel Dana Remus told reporters during an on-the-record call that the volume of litigation filed by Republicans should not be seen as confirmation of the validity of their claims. Rather, as in 2020, when Donald Trump and allied candidates, campaigns and organizations lost more than 60 lawsuits, she told those listening that she remains confident in our courts.
It would be easy to be cynical about the federal judiciary at this juncture. After all, the presidential immunity decision rendered by the Supreme Court last July — which could result in the decimation of Trump’s federal election interference case, even if he loses the election — left even some of the court’s most ardent defenders speechless. But the first vindication of Remus’ prediction came last night — and from an unlikely source.
The American Bar Association gave her a “not qualified” rating due to her lack of trial or real litigation experience.
Now-federal district court judge Sarah Pitlyk, who serves in St. Louis, was one of the more controversial nominees of Trump’s presidency. A former clerk to Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, she faced significant opposition as a nominee for two principal reasons. First, the American Bar Association gave her a “not qualified” rating due to her lack of trial or real litigation experience. Second, she was, as The Washington Post noted when she was confirmed, “lambasted by reproductive rights advocates” not only for her antipathy to abortion rights but for her “vigorous opposition” to both surrogacy and IVF.
But last night, faced with a motion for emergency relief from Missouri’s Republican Attorney General Andrew Bailey, Judge Pitlyk sided with his opponent: U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland. Specifically, Missouri sought to prevent federal poll monitors from entering its polling places, arguing that their presence would violate Missouri election law. After ordering a prompt response from the Justice Department, Pitlyk swiftly denied the temporary restraining order Bailey sought.
Why? Because the poll watchers were specifically agreed to as part of an ongoing settlement between the City of St. Louis and the Justice Department to remedy obstacles to voting for disabled city residents and to ensure they have fair and full access to the polls.
In her short order, Pitlyk reasoned that “[t]he harms to persons with disabilities that led to the Settlement Agreement and the presence of federal observers are documented and uncontested, whereas the harms that the State of Missouri anticipates are speculative — a defect underscored by the fact that similar observers have been present at least twice and their presence apparently went unnoticed.” Ultimately, she ruled that the federal interest in enforcing the Americans with Disabilities Act, “in the absence of any non-speculative threat to election integrity,” should prevail.
Will other conservative judges nominated by Trump hold the line and uphold the law? Stay tuned.
