WASHINGTON—Last week the Senate Judiciary Committee held a hearing on President Trump’s nomination of Thomas Farr to a seat on the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina. Reverend T. Anthony Spearman of Greensboro, NC, who serves as a member of People For the American Way’s African American Ministers In Action, released the following statement:

“Thomas Farr has spent his career protecting voter suppression laws, defending corporations that discriminate, and undermining unions. When North Carolina passed a monstrous voter suppression law that was found to specifically target African American voters, it was Farr who defended it. Yet this is who Trump put forward for a lifetime position in a judicial district that is almost 30 percent African American.

“Our federal courts are for everyone. Farr simply can’t be trusted to act as an unbiased judge to all people when he has led efforts to undermine the rights of people of color in our state. The fact that someone with this kind of record was even nominated is a serious insult to everyone who has been targeted by the regressive laws Farr championed.”

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