Biden Court Pick Colleen Holland Withdraws Her Nomination

One of President Joe Biden’s nominees for a U.S. district court seat has withdrawn her nomination, saying it was a personal choice to step back.

Colleen Holland, who Biden nominated to the U.S. District Court for the Western District of New York, told HuffPost on Tuesday that she’s bowing out.

“I have asked the President not to resubmit my nomination to the Senate,” Holland said in a statement. “This was a personal decision made after careful consideration.”

The news was first reported earlier Tuesday by the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle.

Biden nominated Holland in August, after she was recommended to the White House by Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.).

“Ms. Holland is an accomplished lawyer, with profound integrity and legal intellect, the ability to command a courtroom, and a passion for the preservation of the rule of law that would bring dignity and honor to her post,” Schumer said at the time.

However, Holland was never scheduled for a Senate confirmation hearing, and Republicans there would have almost certainly criticized her relative youth and lack of judicial experience. Holland, 39, is a career law clerk, currently serving as senior counsel to the chief judge on the federal court to which she was nominated. She was previously a litigation associate at several law firms based in Rochester, New York.

Neither of those details is disqualifying for being a federal judge, but they would be easy targets for GOP senators eager to sink a Democrat-backed judicial nominee. The Senate judiciary committee, in particular, has become a platform for Republicans to attack Biden’s nominees with performative outrage ― and then selectively clip video segments from the hearings to share on social media to