The federal judiciary announced a new rule Tuesday to discourage so-called “judge shopping” nationwide by making sure high-profile lawsuits seeking to overturn statewide or national policies are randomly assigned among a larger pool of judges.
The Judicial Conference of the United States, the advisory body for the federal judiciary, announced the change after its semiannual meeting on Tuesday.
The conference has faced pressure from Democrats in Congress and outside groups for more than a year to make a national policy change in response to a trend of conservative litigants challenging Biden administration policies in locations where they are likely to get assigned to a particular judge.
