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Floor Speech

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Mrs. MURRAY. Mr. President, I come to the floor today to urge my colleagues to confirm two excellent judicial nominees to the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington: Tiffany Cartwright, whom President Biden first nominated well over a year ago, and Kimberly Evanson, also nominated last year.

I am proud to say I recommended both of these women after they were vetted and endorsed by a nonpartisan judicial merit selection committee made up of Democratic and Republican legal experts. In fact, since 2021, the Senate has confirmed five judges to the Western District, each of whom were strongly supported by the same committee. And with Ms. Cartwright and Ms. Evanson, it is clear to me they have done it again.

These are two incredibly well-qualified nominees, with records which show they have an expert understanding of our laws, a passion for justice and fairness for everyone, and an appreciation for how their decisions will affect the lives of people across Washington State.

Tiffany Cartwright grew up in Kitsap County in Washington and received her law degree from Stanford University. She has clerked on both the Alaska Supreme Court for Justice Dana Fabe and the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals for Justice Betty B. Fletcher, and today she is a partner at a leading civil rights firm in the Pacific Northwest.

As a trial lawyer in Seattle, Ms. Cartwright has established herself as a preeminent civil rights attorney, dedicated to ensuring our laws are faithfully executed on behalf of the people they are meant to defend. She has represented employees who faced discrimination in the workplace, farmworkers who were denied the overtime they had earned, voters seeking to ensure that their vote was counted, and the families of victims of police misconduct.

She has argued cases in State and Federal court, including before the Washington Supreme Court, and also has earned the support of law enforcement officers, including a Washington State corrections officer, an ATF special agent, both of whom spoke to her dedication to their cases and her commitment to justice.

For 6 years, Ms. Cartwright also served on the local Rules Committee of the Federal Bar Association for the Western District of Washington, offering her unique expertise to consider some of the region's thorniest legal issues.

She also served on the board of directors for Legal Voice, an organization that is focused on women's rights.

Ms. Cartwright is a tested and proven civil rights attorney, with extensive Federal court experience and a track record of seeking justice for people who have faced discrimination, police misconduct, and more. Importantly, she is someone who will apply the law fairly and impartially and will make an excellent addition to the bench in Washington State, as will Kimberly Evanson.

Ms. Evanson was raised by two Washington State public school teachers and has dedicated her career to serving the State.

After attending law school in Georgetown and clerking for Judge Emmet Sullivan on the U.S. District Court in the District of Columbia, she returned home to Washington State where she has practiced law for many years with distinction.

Throughout her career, Ms. Evanson has earned the respect of her peers and her opposing counsel through her work on cases of public importance.

As a partner at Pacifica Law Group, she has represented State, municipal, private, and nonprofit clients on a range of complicated legal issues.

In her work in Seattle, she regularly advises clients on constitutional and statutory questions around the First Amendment, complaints under the Americans with Disabilities Act, and more, not to mention her pro bono work. She has lent her time, services, and expertise to the Seattle Clemency Project and the Western District of Washington's Federal Civil Rights Legal Clinic to provide legal counsel in cases involving access to justice, employment discrimination, housing discrimination, and more.

The ABA has rated her ``well-qualified,'' and it is easy to see why. She has shown she has the expertise to work through the most complicated legal matters and the compassion to understand the stakes of these matters for people's everyday lives, all of which will serve her and the people of Washington State well on the bench of the Western District.

The people of Washington State deserve a court system that delivers justice for everyone, not just the powerful and well connected. They deserve judges who will carefully review each case on the merits and show respect for the law and everyone who appears before them. Based on their records of service in my State, I believe those are exactly the kind of judges that Ms. Cartwright and Ms. Evanson will be.

These appointments are well-deserved, and confirmation is well overdue. So I urge my colleagues to join me in voting for these highly qualified nominees. And I was pleased to see that both of them received bipartisan support in the Judiciary Committee. I hope to see that continue here on the Senate floor.

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