[Congressional Record Volume 167, Number 109 (Wednesday, June 23, 2021)]
[Senate]
[Page S4708]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]





                          JUDICIAL NOMINATIONS

  Mr. SCHUMER. Madam President, now on another matter, this week, the 
Senate will continue restoring balance to the Federal courts by 
considering more of President Biden's judicial appointments.
  Over the next 2 days, we will consider Deborah Boardman to serve as 
district judge in Maryland and Candace Jackson-Akiwumi to serve as 
judge on the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. Together, Ms. Boardman 
and Ms. Jackson-Akiwumi have had over 20 years of experience as Federal 
defenders.
  I believe that bringing professional diversity as well as personal 
diversity to the bench should be and is now a top priority. There are 
plenty of former prosecutors and corporate lawyers wearing black robes. 
It is time that some voting rights attorneys, civil rights attorneys, 
and former Federal defenders, like these two nominees, bring their 
perspectives to the bench.
  A final vote on Ms. Boardman's nomination will come this afternoon, 
and then we will proceed to the nomination of Ms. Jackson-Akiwumi, 
which we will finish before the end of the week. Again, the Senate will 
not leave for the week until we finish considering these judges. The 
Democratic majority in the Senate will continue to swiftly fill 
judicial vacancies.
  On a related note, today, Chairman Peters will ask the Senate to 
approve two critical cyber security nominees: Jen Easterly to be the 
Director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency and 
Robin Carnahan to be the Administrator of the GSA. Both of these 
Agencies play a critical role in our Nation's cyber security.
  The threat of ransomware attacks and other cyber crimes is on the 
rise from State actors as well as cyber bandits who were given 
sanctuary by our adversaries. We need people at the helm on these 
important Agencies to focus on hardening our Nation's cyber security. 
This should be a completely nonpartisan issue, and my Republican 
friends should not object

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