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Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met Monday with a delegation of American congressional Democrats, as he continued to dismiss the notion that his governments ties with the party and the United States more broadly were strained.

The meeting with the 12-member delegation led by House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries took place in Jerusalem, against the backdrop of polling showing waning popularity for the longtime Israeli leader among both parties in Washington.

Already unpopular with Democrats due to strains during the Barack Obama administration, Netanyahu has seen his image take a further hit since the establishment of his new hardline government four months ago, and he has yet to receive a hotly anticipated White House invitation.

The Israeli cabinet has butted heads with US President Biden administration over its effort to overhaul the judiciary as well as its policies toward the Palestinians.

The Prime Ministers Office said Netanyahu used the Monday meeting to focus on two favored topics the Iranian nuclear threat and expanding the Abraham Accords.

The prime minister thanked Congressman Jeffries and the members of the delegation for their support for the State of Israel and emphasized to them the importance of the relationship between Israel and the United States, Netanyahus office said.

Aside from Jeffries, the delegation included Reps. Gregory Meeks, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Yvette Clarke, Dean Phillips and Sara Jacobs.

Also sitting in on the meeting were Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer, who has served as a point-man for Netanyahu on relations with the US, and US Ambassador to Israel Tom Nides.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (R) meets with House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries in Jerusalem on April 24, 2024 (Amos Ben Gershom/GPO)

In an interview on CBSs Face the Nation a day earlier, the premier acknowledged shrinking support for Israel among Democrats but noted that it began before his current government came to power and can be traced to the demonization of Israel in the media, which he said emphasizes the collateral damage incurred by Palestinians in the process of Israel defending itself from terror.

Netanyahu was presented with the results of a recent Gallup poll that showed, for the first time, Democrats are likelier to sympathize with Palestinians than with Israelis.

I think we have to work harder to persuade our Democratic colleagues or those of our Democratic colleagues who forget perhaps that Israel is the solitary democracy in the Middle East that America has no better friend and no better ally than Israel, Netanyahu said.

A separate Pew Research Center poll from last week showed that Americans are more likely than not to see Netanyahu in a negative light, and a plurality of young Republicans have never heard of the longtime conservative premier.

Still, the seniority of the delegation in Israel this week also indicated that the Democratic Partys leadership remains closely invested in Israel, despite the hardline nature of the current government.

Bereaved families and Israelis stand next to memorial candles during a protest against the Israeli governments planned judicial overhaul in Tel Aviv on April 22, 2023. (Erik Marmor/Flash90)

Netanyahu was pressed during the Sunday interview on why he is willing to meet with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, who is slated to announce his candidacy for president, when the Israeli premier already is seen as overly close to the Republican party.

Of course [Ill meet DeSantis], I meet with everyone, Republican and Democrat, he responded. Its my job, and I think its important for Israels bipartisan support in the US.

Biden said last month that Netanyahu would not be invited to the White House in the near term, noting his distress over the governments judicial overhaul effort and urging the premier to walk away from the legislation it had been advancing on the matter.

Netanyahu said Sunday that he valued Israels alliance with the US and his personal friendship with Biden, and insisted that nothing can get in the way of that.

Its an internal matter we have to resolve, and the way were doing it is by seeking consensus, he said, pointing to ongoing negotiations at the Presidents Residence in Jerusalem aimed at reaching a compromise with the opposition on the judicial overhaul. The talks were launched after Netanyahu agreed last month to temporarily pause the legislative blitz in response to massive pushback at home and abroad.

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Netanyahu meets with Democrats as he looks to buck notion of strained US ties - The Times of Israel

President Bidens 22 judicial confirmations from January to the April recess are more than any of his predecessors in the comparable period (President Trump had 12). Still, as I speculated in late January, President Biden is unlikely to top Trumps 231 lower court appointments second only to President Carters 262.

Senate Democrats narrow voting majority has confronted some snags, including within-ranks opposition to some candidates and, more prominently, Senator Dianne Feinsteins possibly extended absence for health reasons, making it almost impossible to move more controversial nominees (however defined) out of the Judiciary Committee. But even if, or when the committee is back to full strength, the administration likely faces a dearth of fillable vacancies, the essential precursor to nominations and confirmations.

Figure 1 and Figure 2 present key metrics for court of appeals and district court confirmations at the Senates April recess in recent presidents third years. Each presidents first three bars are the numbers of confirmations, pending nominations; and vacancies with no nominees (vacancies in-place and announced).

The fourth and fifth bars show additional nominations and additional confirmations through the end of the fourth year. The first and final bars equal the total four-year confirmation numbers shown with presidents names.

Trumps 37 confirmations by the third-year April recess topped all five presidents. Only Bidens 31 comes close, reflecting the priorities that those presidents and their Senate allies gave to staffing the appellate courts.

At the recess, Trumps prospects for 54 total confirmations may have seemed bleak, with only five pending nominees and five more nominee-less vacancies. But eleven more vacancies occurred, and the Senate was able to confirm 17 additional nominees.

Biden also came to the April recess with few pending nominees and nominee-less vacancies, and, to boot, he has six fewer confirmations than Trump. Biden will have 42 confirmations if he gets his six pending nominees confirmed and gets nominees in place and confirmed for the five nominee-less vacancies (not counting the two recent post-recess nominees). Those eleven confirmations are hardly sure things; one nominee has been pending over 460 days and another has provoked within-ranks public opposition.

Forty-two confirmations, even if unlikely, is still 12 short of Trumps 54 (although way ahead of predecessors). The starting point for 12 more appointments is at least 12 more vacancies. Vacancies occurring between the third-year April recess and the end of the fourth year (not shown on Figure 1) ranged, for Bidens four immediate predecessors, from seven to 13. For Trump the figure was eleven, nine from retirements, one from death, and one from then-Judge Barretts Supreme Court appointment.

It seems unlikely that 12 more vacancies will occur and, if so, Biden can fill them. At the end of January 2023, 16 Democrat-appointed court of appeals judges were eligible to retire, on salary, from active status, but since then, only one has done so (one more becomes eligible this summer, and another Democratic appointee resigned). Key to Bidens prospects is whether more will retire, perhaps including some of the six who have been eligible for over ten years. (Twenty-four Republican-appointed circuit judges are similarly eligible, but only four have retired since Biden took office, and one was apparently health-related, and another was a Democrat whom George W. Bush appointed in a deal. Other vacancies may occur.)

And a vacancy is not necessarily a filled vacancy. While Trump was able to fill nine of his 11 post-April recess vacancies, for example, Obama, in his first term, could only fill two of his 13.

Trumps district appointment situation at the April recess was the opposite of the circuit nominee picture the lowest of the five presidents shown, 30 fewer than Bidens 88.

Yet, Trump had more pending nominees and more nominee-less vacancies than any of the others. He and the Senate (with a stronger Republican majority, 53, up from 51 in 2017-18, and having concentrated on appellate appointments in the first two years) seated a record number of district judges.

To Trumps 75 pending nominees at April recess, Biden has 30. To Trumps 84 nominee-less vacancies, Biden has 61. Confirming those 91 current or potential nominees would lift Bidens four-year total to 179, two over Trumps, but a 100% confirmation rate would be unprecedented.

Moreover, five of his 30 pending district nominees have been waiting from 456 to 577 days, suggesting insufficient Democratic support for successful floor votes, a situation unlikely to change as the 2024 elections approach. And one of Mississippis senators has announced her opposition to a recent nominee there, using the so-called blue-slip rule that currently gives home-state senators of either party a virtual veto over nominees.

Indeed, of Bidens 61 nominee-less vacancies, 40 are in states with one or two Republican senators. Of Bidens 119 district nominees, only 15 (13%) have been in states with a Republican senator including four each in Pennsylvania and Ohio.

Bidens avoiding red and purple state vacancies may be because many Republican senators are threatening blue slip vetoes and perhaps because the administration finds it easier to deal with Democratic senators; median days from vacancy to nomination was 399 for the 15 red and purple state nominees, versus 253 for blue state nominees. (Trumps 132 pre-April recess district nominations included 60 to vacancies in blue states 45% compared to Bidens comparable 13%. And Trumps blue and purple state nominees also took longer 446 median days to 229 for red state nominations.).

Bidens pace may be picking up five of the 15 red and purple state nominees came since November but any hope of 177 district appointments will be just that unless large numbers of judges in blue states retire or the pace of red and purple state nominations accelerates rapidly. But that requires Democratic leaderships ending or modifying the blue slip rule without provoking Republicans to use the parliamentary tools at their disposal to shut the process down completely.

In sum, Senate Democrats hoped that their one-vote working majority, compared to Bidens first two years, would give an impetus to their impressive first-two-year confirmation record. Vagaries of life and realities of fillable judicial vacancies have challenged those hopes.

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The Feinstein absence is not the Democrats biggest judges problem - Brookings Institution

1. Another House Democrat Pushes For Clarence Thomas Impeachment Amid Ethics Scandal  Forbes
2. Democrats eye a hearing on Clarence Thomas following gift revelations  NBC News
3. Democrats urge Justice Thomas to step down amid ethics concerns  WOODTV.com

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Another House Democrat Pushes For Clarence Thomas Impeachment Amid Ethics Scandal - Forbes

A state bill ending child marriage in Washington has been tabled until 2024 after a Democratic state senator opted to pass other pieces of legislation this year.

House Bill 1455 passed the Washington House in a unanimous vote in early March, but the bill stalled in the Senate, unable to meet the April 23 legislative deadline to get voted out of the Senate Law and Justice Committee.

Democratic state Senator Manka Dhingra, who chairs the panel, told The Seattle Times that after evaluating the 65 bills sent to her committee, and narrowing down which needed to pass this year and which needed to wait, HB 1455 would have to wait until lawmakers convene early next year. Without moving past the committee, the bill cannot go to a Senate floor vote.

Washington is one of 43 states that allow children to get married, according to Unchained At Last, an organization that advocates against child marriage. It is also one of six states that do not specify an age minimum, meaning a child at any age could get married, with parental consent at age 17 or a judge's approval if younger. Comparably, in other states where children are allowed to marry, the minimum age is between 15 and 17.

Other states have recently moved to raise the minimum marrying age. Data from Unchained At Last show that 19 states have passed bills limiting child marriage, and 10 states, including Washington, have introduced bills seeking to ban all marriages before 18 years of age.

Washington's bill, however, will have to wait until the next legislative session.

"This session, the Law & Justice Committee was referred 174 bills, which was over 50 bills more than any other policy committee in the Senate," Dhingra told Newsweek in a statement. "The simple math of the situation meant that many important bills were not able to get a hearing this year. I know the sponsors will continue working on this legislation, and it will definitely have a hearing next session."

If the next year trends as the last year of available data suggest, there could be roughly 68 minors being wed before the bill comes back before the lawmakers.

Washington Department of Health data shared with Newsweek shows that 4,465 children were married in Washington between 2000 and 2014 and that another 366 are estimated to have been married between 2015 and 2018. Of those marriages, 97 percent involved 17-year-olds, two percent were 16-year-olds and one percent were 15-year-olds.

The figures shared by Unchained At Last show that girls in Washington are disproportionately impacted by child marriages. All the child marriages involving 16-year-olds and 15-year-olds were among girls, and while 10 percent of all child marriages were between a minor boy and an adult woman, marriages between a minor girl and an adult man accounted for 80 percent of all child marriages.

"Even the most mature teen, even a day before their 18th birthday, cannot easily say no to a forced marriage, because of their limited legal rights," Fraidy Reiss, the founder and executive director of Unchained At Last, told Newsweek. "Every day that the current, archaic laws remain on the books is another day that minorsmostly girlscan be forced into an unwanted marriage and subjected to a human rights abuse."

Those seeking a marriage license in Washington need to sign affidavits to prove they are at least 18 years old, but 17-year-olds can also obtain a license with written parental consent and anyone younger can do so if a superior court judge waives the age requirement.

Update 4/19/23, 9:21 a.m. ET: This story was updated with comment from Dhingra.

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Democrat Stops Bill to End Child Marriage in Washington - Newsweek

Carlos David Gamez of Lakeland has filed to challenge incumbent Florida Rep. Jennifer Canady, R-Lakeland, as a Democrat in the 2024 election.

Gamez, 20, is listed as a qualified candidate with the Florida Division of Elections for House District 50, which covers the Lakeland area.

A graduate of Lake Gibson High School, Gamez said he is a student majoring in education at Western Governors University, based in Utah. He expects to graduate in December.

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Gamez said his parents are immigrants from Guatemala and the Dominican Republic. He said he has lived in Lakeland for most of his life.

Gamez said he was spurred to enter the race after seeing news about the expulsion of two Democratic representatives from the Tennessee Legislature after they joined a floor protest for gun restrictions. Both Justin J. Pearson and Justin Jones have since been reinstated.

In the Florida Legislature, one of the things that kind of worries me has been the lack of thorough debate and hearing the public opinion, whether you're with them or not, Gamez said, I think in order for the Legislature to work, it has to be able to hear the opinions and not kind of pass legislation in the middle of the night.

Canady is in her first term and has already filed to seek re-election next year. She was one of two House sponsors on a six-week abortion limit signed into law last week by Gov. Ron DeSantis.

Three candidates are running in Florida House District 48, where current Rep. Sam Killebrew, R-Winter Haven, faces term limits. Polk Countys other House members, Rep. Melony Bell, R-Fort Meade, and Rep. Josie Tomkow, R-Polk City, have filed to seek re-election.

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Lakeland Democrat files to challenge Canady next year in Florida ... - The Ledger