Senate votes to confirm district judges for Illinois

“They have the experience, qualification and integrity to be excellent judges,” Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) said ahead of the vote. “I’m hopeful my colleagues will join me in voting for these two nominees that have bipartisan support.”

{mosads}Lawmakers are still at an impasse on how to pass a continuing resolution to fund the government, which has been shutdown for a week.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) said all the House has to do to reopen the government is take up the Senate-passed “clean” CR. He has repeatedly pointed out on the Senate floor that the government shutdown harms the federal judicial process.

“We find ourselves in a stalemate on providing money to keep the government funding,” Leahy said. “It’s unconscionable.”

It’s unclear where the fight will go from here, with both sides digging in for the first government shutdown since 1996.