Viewpoint: Katie Lane unqualified, unready for Montana post

Doug James

President Donald Trump wants to put Katie Lane, a Virginia attorney, on the United States District Court for the District of Montana.

Let’s skip the polite fiction. She is not qualified.

This isn’t about ideology. I practiced before conservative judges for decades. I respected them because they were prepared, disciplined, and deeply experienced. They understood judging because they first mastered trying cases.

That is the point. The U.S. District Court is not a debating club or a policy shop. It is the primary federal trial court — where witnesses testify, juries are instructed, and evidence is ruled on in real time. It is the front line of federal justice.

Trying cases in federal court is a unique skill set.

You do not learn it in law school. You do not learn it drafting appellate briefs. You do not learn it polishing talking points for a political committee. You learn it as second or third chair behind a seasoned trial lawyer. You learn it by making mistakes under pressure. You learn it by trying cases yourself. You learn it by standing up when the judge says, “Call your next witness.” You learn it by making objections, laying foundations, reading juries, and living with verdicts.

Only after years of that work do you begin to understand what it means to preside over a trial.

Katie Lane graduated from law school in 2017.

Do the math.

She has been a lawyer for less than nine years. Nearly 31 months of that time — roughly two and a half years — were spent clerking for two federal judges. Clerking is honorable and valuable. But it is not practicing law. Watching surgery is not the same as holding the scalpel.

Subtract the clerkships and  time between jobs (there were six jobs in less than nine years) and she has practiced for little more than six years.

Six.

That is not a résumé; it is a warm-up.

Where is the record of significant federal trial work? Where are the jury trials? Where are the complex cases tried to judgment?

If they exist, her sponsors are oddly quiet about them.

In their announcement, supporters praised her service as Deputy Solicitor General and her work in “courts across America.” Notice what is missing: trials, federal jury verdicts, lengthy evidentiary hearings. If she had substantial trial experience, we would be hearing about it.

Instead: silence.

The American Bar Association has long recommended at least 12 years of legal experience for federal judicial nominees. That’s a minimum.  Lane doesn’t measure up.

A lifetime seat on the United States District Court is not an internship. It is not training on the job.

Placing a lawyer with barely six years of actual practice on the federal trial bench is not bold. It is reckless. Federal judges serve for life. Their rulings shape businesses, families, constitutional rights, and personal liberty.

Litigants are not practice material.

The people who walk into federal court deserve a judge who has already stood in the well, managed a trials from start to finish, and carried the weight of  verdicts — not someone with training wheels.

This is not about whether Katie Lane is intelligent. She may be. It is not about whether she is conservative. Many excellent federal judges are conservative.

It is not about the nomination. That is politics.
It is about qualifications. That is substance.
The courtroom is not a classroom, and the bench is not an internship.
Montana deserves a judge seasoned by real trial work — not one still learning the craft.