Maine lawmakers endorse nominees to state's high, superior courts
Mar. 19—Julia Lipez was about to join New England's federal appeals court in Boston when she got caught up in a political deal made by the U.S. Senate. Now, Maine is poised to confirm her to the state's highest court.
A committee of state lawmakers unanimously endorsed Lipez's nomination to the Maine Supreme Judicial Court on Wednesday after a public hearing at the State House. The Senate now has to vote on whether to confirm her.
Lipez received broad support from Maine legislators, unlike in Congress, where she and other nominees of then-President Joe Biden were subjected to hyperpartisan debate. Her nomination to the federal bench was effectively scrapped so Senate Democrats could confirm more lower-level judicial nominations before President Donald Trump took office.
Trump has yet to announce his nominee for the appeals court, but Lipez has already moved on.
Gov. Janet Mills announced her selection of Lipez last month to fill the year-old vacancy on the high court, replacing Associate Justice Joseph Jabar.
On Wednesday, state lawmakers also voted 8-2 to advance Mills' nomination of former U.S. Attorney Darcie McElwee to serve on the state superior court. (McElwee was also terminated amid the change in administration.)
Both women are lifelong Mainers with extensive legal experience, namely as federal prosecutors.
JULIA LIPEZ
Lipez, of Cape Elizabeth, was joined at the Legislature on Wednesday by her husband, two children and parents, including Judge Kermit Lipez, who serves on the U.S. 1st Circuit Court of Appeals where she initially planned to serve.
She said Wednesday that her great-grandparents, who immigrated to the United States after enduring antisemitism in Eastern Europe, "would be quite amazed" at her family's experience in the courts.
Lipez is a Stanford Law School graduate who began her legal career with a prestigious clerkship at the U.S. 4th Circuit Court of Appeals based in Virginia. She worked for three years at a large law firm in New York before returning to Maine in 2011 to work for the U.S. Attorney's Office, where she prosecuted cases involving human trafficking, fraud, narcotics and child exploitation.
She would later coordinate Maine's efforts to fight human trafficking and oversee the U.S. Attorney's Office's appellate division before becoming a Maine superior court judge in 2022. She has presided over cases in western Maine, Kennebec County and Portland, "giving (her) an opportunity to see up close the lives of Mainers from different parts of the state and how they are affected by the criminal legal system."
Lipez was asked twice Wednesday about questions raised by U.S. Sen. John Kennedy, R-Louisiana, during her nomination process to the federal bench, in which he accused her of giving a light sentence in 2023 to a Woodstock man convicted of unlawful sexual contact with two young girls.
As she told Kennedy, Lipez she is obligated to follow sentencing laws set by the Legislature. Lipez said she ordered what prosecutors had requested and that she takes victims' concerns seriously.
"I have personally sat many times with victims and survivors of crime while they have shared with me in harrowing detail what they experienced," Lipez said.
District Attorney Neil McLean, whose office worked on the Woodstock case, defended Lipez's decision in that case, saying she was only allowed to consider a sentence based on limited facts shared in court.
"Oftentimes, they only know what we provided them, or what they learned from the trial," McLean said.
Several attorneys, including a former federal prosecutor, members of the Maine Trial Lawyers Association and the Maine State Bar Association, testified in support of Lipez's nomination Wednesday. No one in attendance spoke against her.
DARCIE McELWEE
McElwee, of Scarborough, was most recently the District of Maine's chief federal law enforcement officer. She was terminated in February by order of the Trump administration, which is not uncommon during presidential turnover. The Trump administration has yet to announce a new nominee.
She was raised in Aroostook County and is a University of Maine School of Law graduate. Her parents were "career public servants," McElwee said. Her mother, Carol McElwee, taught English and was a Republican state lawmaker from 2012 to 2018. Her father was an attorney and district judge.
Gerald Reid, an attorney for the governor's office, highlighted McElwee's lengthy experience prosecuting domestic violence cases. Several Maine attorneys, both prosecutors and defense, sang her praises.
McElwee told lawmakers the state has come a long way since her first domestic violence case in the late 1990s, when she was a prosecutor in Bangor. She also discussed her experience prosecuting firearm-related offenses in a uniquely gun friendly state.
"Maine is a hunting and sport state," McElwee said. "Maine gun owners want to be responsible as a whole."
At one point in questioning, McElwee was asked about videos she has made as U.S. attorney recognizing Transgender Day of Remembrance and Transgender Day of Visibility.
McElwee told lawmakers she didn't believe these were political positions and that she made videos raising awareness for elder abuse, sextortion and human trafficking.
"It wasn't to take any political position, it wasn't to take any activist role, but instead to take the No. 1 job that I had: to make sure that every person who lived in Maine felt safe," McElwee said.
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