Biden vetoes bill adding new judges to courts following Trump’s win

FILE PHOTO: U.S. President Joe Biden visits the Department of Labor, in Washington

(Reuters) – Democratic U.S. President Joe Biden on Monday vetoed legislation to add 66 new judges to understaffed federal courts nationally, a once widely bipartisan measure that lawmakers in his party began to abandon after Republican President-elect Donald Trump won the Nov. 5 election and chance to name the first batch of judges.

The outgoing president made good on a veto threat issued two days before the bill on Dec. 12 passed the Republican-led U.S. House of Representatives, dooming what would have been the first major expansion of the federal judiciary since 1990.

(Reporting by Nate Raymond in Boston; Editing by Himani Sarkar)