Mr. President:
Today the Senate is expected to confirm an additional judicial nominee. With this vote, we will have confirmed 62 Article III nominees during this Congress. More than half of these have been for vacancies designated as judicial emergencies. That is real progress. Over 72 percent of President Obama’s judicial nominees have been confirmed.
Morgan Christen is nominated to be United States Circuit Judge for the Ninth Circuit. Justice Christen received her B.A. from the University of Washington in 1983, and her J.D. from Golden Gate University Law School in 1986. After graduating from law school, she clerked for the Hon. Brian Shortell on the Alaska Superior Court in Anchorage.
In 1987 she was hired at Preston Gates & Ellis LLP, working as an Associate until 1992. She was a Partner in the firm from 1993 to 2002. At that firm she was a general civil litigator, primarily representing plaintiffs. She began by assisting with large litigation projects. One of her most notable early matters involved serving on the liability team representing the state of Alaska in its claims for compensation arising from the Exxon Valdez oil spill. After the state settled its liability claim in 1991, she defended claims brought by individuals who argued the state’s response to the spill was inadequate.
By the time Justice Christen became a partner in 1993, she had developed a practice in Jones Act personal injury claims and was lead counsel in a case in the U.S. Court of Claims representing the parents of an infant who died after receiving a childhood vaccination. She also served as lead counsel on four aviation fatality cases between 1993 and 1999, representing the estate of an FAA employee who was killed in a mid-air collision, the estate of a pilot killed during a catastrophic engine failure and in-flight failure, among others. She has also served as the lead counsel in an Equal Pay Act and represented a fuel barge line in several commercial disputes. Finally, from 1999 to 2001 over half of her practice was devoted to defending two physician practice groups in a federal Medicaid fraud investigation and related False Claims Act case, and assisting with the defense of a class action antitrust case brought against purchasers of salmon harvested in Alaska.
In 2001 she was appointed to the Alaska Superior Court, where she served from January 9, 2002 until her elevation to the Supreme Court in 2009. The Superior Court is the court of general jurisdiction in Alaska. As a Superior Court judge, her docket was comprised entirely of civil cases. From 2005 to 2009 she served as Presiding Judge of the Third Judicial District of the Superior Court. In this position she supervised approximately 40 judicial officers in 13 court locations.
Justice Christen was appointed to the Alaska Supreme Court on March 4, 2009 and has been a member of that court from April 6, 2009 to the present. She was nominated for that seat by the Alaska Judicial Council, composed by three members of the bar, three members of the public appointed by governors, and the chief justice. She was then selected from a slate of two nominees by Governor Sarah Palin.
The American Bar Association Standing Committee on the Federal Judiciary has rated Justice Christen with a unanimous “Well Qualified” rating.
I thank the Chair and yield the floor.
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