Ali Najmi, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s appointment to the committee charged with vetting judicial nominees, wants to see more judges serving in the
Ali Najmi says the mayor’s advisory committee will expand access to the city’s judicial system and recruit judges based on merit, not connectionsAli Najmi, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s appointment to the committee charged with vetting judicial nominees, wants to see more judges serving in the city’s long-overburdened family courts.
“How litigants and attorneys are treated — that’s gonna be a huge criteria in terms of evaluating a prospective judge,” Najmi told amNew York Law. Najmi was tapped in January to run the Mayors’ Advisory Committee on the Judiciary, the panel responsible for evaluating and appointing judges to the city’s family and criminal courts, as well as interim judges to its civil courts. And those judges are eligible to get picked up by the state court system as acting justices on the state Supreme Court.Thank you for subscribing!The committee has long been characterized as a black box, which has raised concerns about political favoritism and backroom dealmaking. The Mamdani administration is trying to reshape that narrative. In January, the mayor added public reporting requirements to better publicize the committee’s criteria for recommending judges. Najmi, an election and civil rights lawyer with a history of advocating for Muslim political and judicial electoral campaigns through the Muslim Democratic Club, said that he would be broadening the candidate pool beyond prosecutors and court attorneys, who are traditionally more likely to be chosen for appointment. “I know how difficult that can be for a lot of people who come from a public service background, and I really look forward to empowering people who deserve to be on the bench that wouldn’t be able to succeed in the election process,” Najmi said.by the mayor. In the short-term, the committee will be looking to appoint judges for 15 vacancies in criminal court, three in family court and 15 in interim civil court — where its role in expanding the family court judiciary comes in. When a sitting civil court judge successfully runs for a Supreme Court seat, their civil court seat is vacated, and that interim appointment power goes to the mayor. In practice, Najmi said, these interim appointments are usually placed either in criminal or family court, which desperately needs more judicial staff, according to a report the Franklin T. Williams CommissionThe commission’s report found that judicial temperament was often lacking in family court judges, with anecdotes about judges yelling at litigants or interrupting them. Najmi said the committee will be looking at applicants with the intention of changing that culture. Though Najmi was candid about the values of the committee, transparency is a more legally thorny area for the delegation to reform.giving “comprehensive” information on how the committee arrived at decisions for appointed applicants. In his executive order, Mamdani added requirements for the committee to publish aggregate data on the number and demographics of judicial applicants, but didn’t ask the committee to explain their recommendations. Najmi said that the committee is limited by confidentiality rules from going into the reasoning behind its decisions to lift some candidates up and not others. “We don’t want to embarrass anybody,” he said.”People feel like they could be unfairly harmed in this process. Also you’re not going to get people to apply. So preserving confidentiality is very important.” It’s the same sense of confidentiality that the New York City Bar Association observes in judicial recommendations. Until last year, the recent New York City mayors informally sought recommendations from the city bar’s Judiciary Committee in addition to MACJ, until the former chair under Mayor Eric Adams ended the policy.“This is hiring someone for a job,” said Stephen Louis, a New York Law School professor who is also co-chair of the city bar’s New York City Affairs Committee. “I would not want any job to say, these are the five people… I thought of, and these are the pluses and minuses of each of them.” Najmi also said that he’s been in talks with the New York City Bar Association President Muhammad Faridi, but didn’t have anything formal to announce about what MACJ’s dynamic with the bar would be going forward. As part of his civic education efforts, Najmi envisions the website also having the term end dates for appointed judges and information about how many judges are opening in a given year — all information that is currently unavailable.In addition to being transparent with public information, Najmi has had to make ethical considerations around his own practice as he takes over the responsibilities of the unpaid executive post. In addition to his election law practice, Najmi serves as special counsel for personal injury firm Liakas Law, and has promised not to appear in New York City family or criminal court while he holds the position. He said he is working to formalize a similar code of conduct for the whole court. “I’m going, in my opinion, above and beyond just to make sure that we are doing everything ethically,” Najmi said. The membership of the full 19-member body has yet to take shape under Mamdani but is not just made up of mayoral appointees. The presiding justices for the city’s two appellate courts, the Chief Judge and a rotation of law school deans all pick nominees as well. Najmi said he’s been having meetings with a range of legal organizations, public defender groups, district attorneys, bar associations in order to solicit candidates for upcoming vacancies. He wants the committee to be accessible, he said. “I think the criteria is going to be involving judicial temperament, competency in the law, legal experience. In any interview process, the committee would ask people about how they’re going to make their decision making process,” Najmi said.
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