WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Senators Cory Booker, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and Bob Menendez (both D-N.J.) today applauded President Joe Biden’s nomination of Mr. Jamel Semper to the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey to succeed District Judge John Michael Vazquez. Semper has received support from both New Jersey senators throughout the nomination process as a qualified nominee that serves with a sense of justice and empathy.
“Jamel Semper is a highly qualified nominee with a distinguished legal career and years of service to New Jersey at the state and federal levels. I’m confident in his ability to preside over cases fairly and impartially. I thank President Biden for nominating Jamel Semper, and I look forward to his hearing before the Judiciary Committee and confirmation by the Senate,” said Senator Booker.
“I am thrilled that President Biden heeded our recommendation to nominate Jamel Semper to an open seat on the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey. He is an extremely well-qualified nominee to ascend to the federal bench — an alumnus of Rutgers University School of Law, a longtime prosecutor in Union and Essex Counties, and currently the Chief of the Organized Crime and Gang Unit at the New Jersey U.S. Attorney’s Office,” said Senator Menendez. “For years, Mr. Semper has served the Garden State with fairness and compassion, dedicating his career to keeping New Jerseyans safe. Thanks to his community-focused approach to law enforcement, he enjoys the strong support of major voices and organizations within New Jersey’s diverse communities of color. Should he be confirmed, Mr. Semper would further our collective effort to diversify our federal bench and help ensure that all individuals regardless of their background have access to equal justice under the law. I look forward to supporting Mr. Semper’s confirmation on the Senate floor and urge my colleagues to do the same.”
Jamel Semper has been a prosecutor for nearly his entire career, and previously served as Director of the Special Prosecution Unit in the Essex County Prosecutors Office. He began his career in the Violent Crimes Unit at the United States Attorneys and has since held the positions of head of the Newark Violent Crime Unit, Chief of the Organized Crime and Gang Unit, and Chief of the Violent Crime Unit. Jamel is the current Deputy Chief of the Criminal Division at the United States Attorneys’ Office in which he establishes and implements the USAO’s violent crime reduction strategy.
Since 2021, Senators Booker and Menendez have consistently urged President Biden to appoint federal court judges to address New Jersey’s “judicial emergency” of several longstanding district court vacancies prior to the Biden Administration. If confirmed, Mr. Semper would be the ninth Federal District Judge of New Jersey that President Joe Biden has nominated and the Senate has confirmed, including Julien X. Neals, Zahid Quraishi, Christine O’Hearn, Karen Williams, Georgette Castner, Evelyn Padin, Michael Fabiarz, and Robert Kirsch.
Senator Booker has served on the Senate Judiciary Committee since 2018. He has been a leader in the Senate on criminal justice and policing reform since he was first elected in 2013. Booker has introduced numerous criminal justice reform proposals, including: the Fair Chance Act, the CARERS Act, the MERCY Act, the Dignity for Incarcerated Women Act, the Second Look Act, the Justice in Policing Act, and the EQUAL Act. He was also a key architect of the most sweeping overhaul of the criminal justice system in decades, the First Step Act, which was signed into law in 2018.
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