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Floor Speech

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Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, today, the Senate will vote to confirm Judge James Simmons, Jr., who has been nominated to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California.

Born in Inglewood, CA, Judge Simmons received his B.A. from the University of California at Berkeley in 2001 and went on to earn his J.D. at Golden Gate University School of Law in 2004. Judge Simmons began his legal career as a deputy city attorney for the city of San Diego in 2005, a role in which he tried 19 jury trials on behalf of the city in 1 year. In 2006, he became a trial attorney at the San Diego District Attorney's Office. As an attorney in the gang prosecution unit, Judge Simmons tried 30 jury trials over 11 years. Since 2017, Judge Simmons has served as a Superior Court judge for the San Diego Superior Court. Having presided over thousands of matters and 12 bench trials, Judge Simmons has notably never been reversed by a reviewing court.

The American Bar Association has unanimously rated Judge Simmons ``well qualified'' to serve on the Southern District of California, and Senators Feinstein and Padilla strongly support his nomination as well.

I will be supporting this highly qualified nominee, and I urge all of my colleagues to do the same.

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