by Mike Donoghue, Vermont News First, Vermont Business Magazine President Joe Biden said Thursday he intends to nominate Mary Kay Lanthier, the supervisory attorney for the Rutland County Public Defender's Office since 2007, to serve as the US District Court Judge in Vermont.
Vermont News First was first to report on Wednesday that Lanthier had recently moved to the head of the line to replace Chief Federal Judge Geoffrey W. Crawford, who is moving to "Senior Status." Three other lawyers that had been proposed were put on the back burner in recent weeks, while the FBI and Department of Justice vetted Lanthier.
Lanthier, 53, of Orwell, began her legal career as a judicial law clerk for the trial courts in Chittenden County and Addison County from 1996 to 1998. She was an associate at Keiner & Dumont law firm in Middlebury from 1998 to 2000 before becoming a public defender representing indigent people charged in Addison County from 2000 to 2003.
Lanthier was hired as an associate and later promoted to partner in the law firm Marsh & Wagner in Middlebury from 2003 to 2007 before taking her state job in Rutland County.
Besides criminal law, Lanthier had worked primarily on family law and workers’ compensation cases.
About half the work on the federal docket involves criminal cases. The other half is civil – a mixture that include a wide range of cases ranging from civil rights to employment discrimination to contract disputes and more.
The annual pay for federal district court judges was bumped this year from $232,600 to $243,300.
Lanthier, if approved by the U.S. Senate, would be based at the federal courthouse at 151 West Street in Rutland.
Vermont's other active federal courthouse is on Elmwood Avenue in Burlington, where Judge Christina Reiss presides. Reiss was appointed in 2009 and previously served as Chief Judge in Vermont 2010-17.
Lanthier received her undergraduate degree from Amherst College in 1993 and her law degree from Northeastern University School of Law in 1996. She taught evidence labs at Vermont Law and Graduate School from 2017 to 2023.
She is a past chair of the Vermont Chapter of the American College of Trial Lawyers and serves as the treasurer for the Vermont Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers.
Biden, before being sworn in, had said he wanted to appoint women, public defenders, people of color and other minorities to the bench. Lanthier was among four women that the White House announced on Thursday for judicial nominations – two to the district court level and two to the appeals court level.
The announcement on Thursday was the 50th round of judicial nominations now totaling 244 by Biden.
Senators Bernie Sanders, (I-Vermont), and Peter Welch (D-Vermont), who set up a screening panel of Democrats and Progressives to review the Vermont applications, applauded Biden for going forward with Lanthier.
“Mary Kay Lanthier has dedicated her career to public defense and ensuring that everyone has a fair chance in the courtroom, and I expect that she will bring that experience to the bench if she is confirmed to this role,” Sanders said in a statement.
“Her peers in the Vermont legal community know that her skill, high ethical standards, and professionalism will carry over to her service as a federal judge. I am confident that she will be a fair and impartial federal judge and that everyone in her courtroom will be treated with the compassion, respect, and dignity they deserve,” Sanders said in a prepared statement.
Welch, a lawyer and a member of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, said he thinks Lanthier is an excellent nominee to serve her home state.
"She has spent her legal career here in Vermont where she has earned a clear and deserved respect – in the courtroom, in the legal community, and across the state,” the junior senator said.
“Ms. Lanthier has devoted her career to ensuring that the legal system works for everyone, no matter their background, and her formidable trial experience will serve her well on the bench. As a former public defender, I look forward to Ms. Lanthier’s public service continuing in this new capacity in the community she calls home.”
If approved, Lanthier will give women both seats on the district court bench in Vermont.
Vermont could end up with women in the top four fulltime federal judgeships. Judge Beth Robinson sits on the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in New York City, while Judge Heather Cooper presides in the Bankruptcy Court.
The advancement of Lanthier application in recent weeks meant Assistant Federal Defender Steven L. Barth, Vermont Law School Professor Jessica C. Brown and First Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael P. Drescher were put on the back burner.
Vermont News First had reported in March that Barth, Brown and Drescher were the top picks by the special Sanders/Welch screening committee.
Some members of the legal profession and the general public have questioned the makeup of the screening committee. All three lawyers appointed by Sanders, a non-lawyer, to the seven-member screening committee have never filed a case in U.S. District Court in Vermont, according to an investigation by Vermont News First earlier this year.
A fourth screener was listed for only 11 federal cases in Vermont in her career.
The Sanders/Welch screening committee also had nobody representing any of the offices that deal on a daily basis with federal judges in Vermont. They include the court clerk's office, the U.S. Marshal, U.S. Probation, U.S. Attorney and the Federal Defender.
Sanders and Welch have been under pressure to advance a recommendation because President Biden wants to appoint as many judges as possible before the General Election in November when the Democrats could lose the White House.
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