DeSantis Blames Absent Republicans for Biden-Picked Judge's Confirmation

Gov. Ron DeSantis on Tuesday claimed that Floridians would "suffer the consequences" after five Republican Senators missed a vote confirming the Biden-picked Judge Embry Kidd to the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

DeSantis called Kidd a "leftist judge" whose appointment by a 49-45 vote only happened because Republicans, including Vice President-elect JD Vance and Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, did not show up on Monday.

"This leftist judge would have been voted down and the seat on the important 11th circuit would have been filled by Donald Trump next year had Republicans showed up," DeSantis posted to social media Tuesday morning. "Now, the leftist judge will have a lifetime appointment and the people of FL, AL, and GA will suffer the consequences."

Indiana Senator Mike Braun, Montana Senator Steve Daines, and Tennessee Senator Bill Hagerty also missed the vote, allowing Kidd to join the Atlanta-based circuit court. Of its 13 judges, seven were appointed by Republican presidents.

Based out of Tampa, Kidd will be the second Black man confirmed to an appellate court judgeship in the last decade, Bloomberg reported. Republicans, however, are taking shots at him for his 2007 contributions to a Harvard Law Review article criticizing capital child rape laws as too "intense" and "mired in racial and class-based prejudice" that will "almost certainly yield extreme arbitrariness and inadequate process for many defendants."

In 2023, Florida was the first state to pass a law instituting the death penalty for child rapists.

Kidd graduated from Emory College and Yale Law School before becoming a federal prosecutor in Orlando's U.S. Attorney's Office. In 2019, he became a U.S. Magistrate Judge in the Orlando Division of the U.S. District Court fro the Middle District of Florida.