Gov. Janet Mills announced Friday that she had nominated Julia Lipez, a superior court justice in Augusta, to serve on the Maine Supreme Judicial Court.

Justice Julia Lipez

The nomination comes days after Chief Justice Valerie Stanfill said in her annual State of the Judiciary address that the judicial branch is struggling with vacancies, including a spot on the high court that has been open for more than a year.

Mills also nominated Darcie McElwee, most recently Maine’s lead federal prosecutor, to serve as a judge on the superior court. McElwee was fired last week by the Trump administration. It’s typical for U.S. attorneys to resign, or be let go, during a change in administration.

Lipez, of Cape Elizabeth, has served on the Maine Superior Court since 2022 and was previously an assistant U.S. Attorney for Maine.

“I am delighted to nominate Justice Julia Lipez to the Maine Supreme Judicial Court,” Mills said in a statement. “Throughout her service to Maine people – first as an Assistant U.S. Attorney and presently as a Justice of the Maine Superior Court – Justice Lipez has earned deep respect for her fairness, intellect, and commitment to the rule of law. Maine is lucky to have a jurist of Justice Lipez’s caliber as a nominee for the Supreme Judicial Court.”

Lipez was nominated last year by President Biden to the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Boston, but was one of four appellate nominees that senators agreed not to confirm as part of a deal between Democrats and Republicans so they could quickly confirm other nominees before the change in administration.

She first applied for a position on Maine’s highest court in November 2023, according to records from the governor’s office.

“I have been privileged to work on behalf of the people of Maine, first as an Assistant U.S. Attorney in the District of Maine, and now as a justice on the Maine Superior Court,” Lipez wrote. “It would be an honor to continue that service on the Law Court.”

Prior to becoming a superior court justice, Lipez worked as a federal prosecutor from 2011-2022, leading prosecutions of human trafficking, child exploitation, fraud, narcotics and violent crimes, according to Mills’ office. She was promoted to chief of the appellate division of the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Maine in 2019.

A graduate of Stanford Law School, Lipez also worked as a private lawyer at Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr LLP in New York. She also clerked for a federal appellate judge in New York in 2006, after receiving her law degree from Stanford Law School.

Justice Julia Lipez presides over an attempted murder trial in Oxford County Superior Court in 2022. Andree Kehn/Sun Journal file photo

Lipez said she is “deeply honored” by Mills’ nomination.

“If confirmed, I will serve the people of Maine as I have throughout my career in law and public service – with a commitment to fairness and justice and equality before the law,” she said in a statement.

Last year, Joseph Jabar, a longtime justice for the state’s highest court, said he was passed over for reappointment by the governor. He was first appointed to the court in 2009 and reappointed by then-Gov. Paul LePage, who later accused Jabar of reneging on an agreement to retire after he reached 20 years of legislative and judicial service.

Jabar said in an interview last year that he had expressed interest in another seven-year term, but was told by legal counsel for Mills that the administration wanted to diversify the court. He has since returned to private practice in Waterville.

FORMER U.S. ATTORNEY, OTHERS NOMINATED

McElwee applied for a position in the superior court on Nov. 26, three weeks after Trump was elected, according to records from the governor’s office.

Darcie McElwee. Photo courtesy of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Maine

“As I prepare to transition after more than two decades of service to the U.S. Department of Justice, I enthusiastically seek nomination to the Maine Judiciary,” she wrote. Her application doesn’t reference any reasons for leaving the DOJ.

McElwee said in an email Friday she is “honored by the nomination of Governor Mills and excited by the prospect of this new challenge.”

She grew up in Aroostook County, raised by a teacher who later became a state lawmaker and an attorney who later became a judge.

Mills also announced two other nominations on Friday.

Amy Dieterich of Auburn, a practicing attorney for 16 years, was nominated to be a judge for Maine District Court.

Judge Matthew Tice was nominated for reappointment to the Maine District Court, where he has served since 2018. Prior to that appointment, he was an assistant district attorney in Cumberland County for more than two decades.

All of the nominations will be reviewed by the Legislature’s Judiciary Committee and confirmed by the Maine Senate. After the confirmation process, the judicial branch will determine the areas where each nominee will serve.