Following Sen. King’s Vote To Confirm Joshua Divine, Demand Justice Calls Out Need To Oppose All Of Trump’s Judicial Nominees
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 22, 2025
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Washington, DC – Today the Senate voted to confirm two of Donald Trump’s judicial nominees to lifetime appointments.
One of those nominees, Joshua Divine, was confirmed to serve jointly on the U.S. District Courts for the Eastern and Western Districts of Missouri–and joining all Senate Republicans present in voting in favor of his nomination was Senator Angus King (I-ME).
After initially voting against cloture on Divine, Sen. King inexplicably then voted to confirm the nominee.
Joshua Divine has a long record of litigation against reproductive freedom, leading efforts to end the FDA’s decades-long approval of mifepristone and to undermine the will of voters by defending the state’s anti-abortion law against changes implemented via ballot initiative. Divine also led an effort to have Missouri interfere in New York’s prosecution of Donald Trump.
In response to Sen. King’s vote in favor of Joshua Divine, Demand Justice Interim Director Maggie Jo Buchanan released the following statement:
“At nearly the same time the vote was occurring, President Trump was using the Oval Office to baselessly call former President Obama a ‘traitor’ as part of the administration’s desperate bid to distract from the Epstein crisis of their own making. Given actions like these–let alone his repeated attacks on judges and defiance of the courts overall–the fact that any Senator voted for one of Trump’s judicial nominees is unacceptable.
“To say Senator King’s vote on the nomination of Joshua Divine is a shock would be a massive understatement. Any person who believes in the critical importance of reproductive rights would not vote to put an anti-abortion extremist in a lifetime position on the federal bench.The Senator owes his constituents an explanation–whatever that may be.
“Trump has been abundantly clear in his choice of judicial nominees–he wants a federal judiciary that will bow down to him, and the easiest way to achieve that is to stack the courts with radical loyalists. This isn’t the time for performative bipartisanship and compromise. Americans want their elected officials standing up for our rights and that means standing against Trump’s further hijacking of our courts.”
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