Oldest sitting federal judge, 96, comes back swinging after colleagues get her banned from hearing cases

Judge Pauline Newman, who is 96 years old, is clapping back after she was removed from the bench by her colleagues because she refused to take a six-hour-long competency test.

(Video Credit: New Civil Liberties Alliance)

Newman is the oldest sitting judge in America. She was appointed to the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit by President Ronald Reagan in 1985.

The judge’s leftist compatriots blocked her from hearing cases on the grounds of “mental fitness,” something they refuse to do when it comes to President Biden or other politicians, though she allegedly shows no sign of being mentally impaired.

After serving on the bench for 39 years, her colleagues on the Federal Circuit’s Judicial Council cited her alleged physical frailty as well as her refusal to cooperate with an investigation into “reasonable concerns” surrounding her mental acuity, according to the Daily Mail.

Newman asserts that Chief Judge Kimberly Moore informed her that she has to take senior status which she called “ridiculous.”

(Video Credit: NewsNation)

Newman filed a federal lawsuit against her fellow judges in May.

In the suit, she asserted, “I never had a heart attack, never fainted, wasn’t hospitalized as Judge Moore said, and apparently told all the judges on my court that I was disabled, not able to move around and not able to think straight.”

Newman gave a compelling interview to the New Civil Liberties Alliance, contending that she felt she “should not succumb or set a pattern of judicial colleagues to be able to bully, intimidate and force out a colleague they don’t like, who writes dissents, so I refused.”

Court documents reveal that the judge stated she is mentally and physically fit enough to continue in her role and has obtained independent evaluations from two doctors who concur and issue the same opinion.

“I cannot understand why my colleagues have decided at this stage of my life to destroy me, destroy my reputation, to remove my opportunity to decide cases,” she commented.

The Judicial Council is making a different claim, saying that they reached the decision after conducting over 20 interviews with court staff that pointed to “significant mental deterioration including memory loss, confusion, lack of comprehension, paranoia, anger, hostility, and severe agitation.”

“Judge Newman has been having trouble recalling events, conversations, and information just days old and having trouble comprehending basic information that court staff communicate to her,” the council wrote in its decision.

Source: New Civil Liberties Alliance/YouTube

It should be noted that federal judges who are tapped by a president and confirmed by the Senate, are appointed for life with no mandated retirement age.

Newman’s attorneys are calling her suspension from the bench “flatly illegal.” They are seeking a review from a separate committee that oversees judicial conduct.

“Were the committee formed to investigate these baseless allegations actually interested in ascertaining the truth of the matter — that Judge Newman, despite her age, is in no way disabled — it could have done so months ago,” the lawyers charged, according to court documents.

“Instead, Chief Judge Moore and the committee she appointed have been interested in one thing and one thing only — keeping Judge Newman off the bench via the exercise of raw power unconstrained by statutory requirements, constitutional limits, any notions of due process, conflict of interest rules, or even basic fairness,” they asserted.

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