Trump Picks Sacramento Judge for Eastern District Federal Trial Bench
The nomination of Judge James Arguelles comes a little over a month after Trump selected Fresno litigator Dirk Paloutzian to serve on the caseload-burdened federal trial court.
June 08, 2020 at 06:05 PM
3 minute read
Sacramento County Superior Court Judge James Arguelles appearing Monday via the court's live stream on YouTube.
President Donald Trump on Monday announced that Sacramento County Superior Court Judge James Arguelles will be his second nomination to the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California.
Arguelles has served on the Sacramento County bench since 2010 and was among Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's final trial court appointments. He handles a trial and civil writs calendar, although he has also overseen remote criminal proceedings during the court's recent pandemic operations.
Sacramento defense attorney Mark Reichel praised Arguelles, a former prosecutor in the U.S. Attorney's Office.
"He is a very smart lawyer, is very well-rounded as a person and has relatively broad experience," Reichel said. "He is personable and kind to litigants and their lawyers, works hard. Judge Arguelles might turn out to be all that is right with lifetime appointments."
U.S. Attorney McGregor Scott of the Eastern District called Arguelles an "excellent" nomination.
"I think any administration would be hard-pressed to find someone as well-qualified as Jim Arguelles for a district court position," Scott said.
Arguelles' nomination comes a little over a month after Trump selected Fresno litigator Dirk Paloutzian to serve on the caseload-burdened court. Paloutzian's nomination is pending before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee.
The 34-county court, which stretches from the Oregon border southeast to Bakersfield, has been beset with vacancies and a crushing caseload that led the sole non-senior judge in Fresno to end oral arguments in most civil motions and to warn that civil trials scheduled through 2021 were unlikely to take place on time.
Before joining the Sacramento bench, Arguelles was a partner at Stevens, O'Connell & Jacobs, a Sacramento firm originally formed by two U.S. attorneys for the Eastern District, Charles Stevens and George O'Connell. The firm was absorbed by DLA Piper in 2011.
Arguelles was an assistant U.S. attorney in the Eastern District before joining the firm. He also worked previously at Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, the White House said. A graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy and Harvard Law School, Arguelles is a military judge in the U.S. Army Reserve.
Read more:
Fresno Litigator Is Nominated to Beleaguered Eastern District Trial Bench
'Uncharted Waters': Fresno Judge Sets 'Emergency Procedures' as Resources Squeezed
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