Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Matthew J. Maddox

The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was keep‎. I've never stated this in a closure before but I'm basing this decision in part due to majority views because there are conflicting interpretations of WP:JUDGE. The other option is No consensus but there seems to be a majority of editors seeing this as a Keep situation.

It's disconcerting as a regular closer of AFD discussions to have such a wide variety of closure results for indviduals in the same occupation. Maybe it's time to amend WP:JUDGE to be more definitive? Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 22:35, 28 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Matthew J. Maddox

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does not meet notability under WP:NPOL and is WP:TOOSOON since nominee has not been confirmed as a federal district court judge. There are also no secondary sources Let'srun (talk) 19:06, 29 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Note: This discussion has been included in the deletion sorting lists for the following topics: Law and Maryland. Spiderone^{(Talk to Spider)} 22:46, 29 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Keep Nominees for lifetime appointments to the federal bench & announced on the White House official home page are notable for that reason alone. Most nominees have numerous other reasons they are notable without the announcement, otherwise they wouldn't make it to that point. Even if the nomination fails it receives numerous headlines & therefore the person is still notable.MIAJudges (talk) 07:12, 30 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Per the WP:USCJN section on U.S. District Court judges, "Nominees whose nomination has not yet come to a vote are not inherently notable." Let'srun (talk) 15:08, 30 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

The WP:USCJN section on U.S. District Court judges directive states a nomination doesn't mean they are inherently notable but that does not mean the nominees aren't notable. A person is never nominated to an equal branch of government for a lifetime appointment by the leader of the executive branch without having a lengthy career & background. All of the nominees have references to their careers in the press. The president's own announcement details each of their bios. MIAJudges (talk) 00:49, 1 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Delete There simply are no independent, third-party, reliable sources that give the subject the "significant coverage" in multiple sources the GNG requires in order to meet notability standards. By contrast, being nominated to the federal bench or appearing on the White House website meet no notability standards on Wikipedia. Ravenswing 06:16, 1 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Every single previous nominee to be a federal judge in the history of Wikipedia has never had their page taken down or moved because they were not notable except for Tiffany Cartwright. And her page has been reinstated but she hasn’t been confirmed yet. So respectfully, what your advocating is actually going against standards on Wikipedia. MIAJudges (talk) 06:19, 1 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
On Wikipedia, notability is determined through meeting one or more of several notability guidelines: in this case, for instance, by meeting WP:GNG, WP:SIGCOV or WP:POLITICIAN. SIGCOV is the key here: it is not sufficient for a source (however reliable) to say "President Biden sent Soandso's name to the Senate for nomination." SIGCOV goes into some detail about what's needed, but the gist is that a source needs to discuss the subject -- not the nominating process, not President Biden, not the Senate Judiciary Committee, the subject -- in "significant detail," so that an article could be credibly made from that source alone.
And that is it. I've told you a couple of times over that there are no other pertinent, explicit criteria. I have challenged you a couple times over to demonstrate that there is pertinent, explicit criteria such as you describe. We do not make determinations based on the standards you think should be in place were you the one making the rules here. We make them based on the notability criteria already in place. Period.
A couple more corrections: you state, without the slightest shred of evidence, that every single previous nominee had an article prior to their confirmation. You also state, erroneously, that the Cartwright article has been reinstated to articlespace. It has not. It is in draft space right now. Ravenswing 10:28, 1 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
@Ravenswing

You know very well that the Tiffany Cartwright page was back up when I wrote that. The page was taken down AFTER I wrote that & you know it was. To write I "state, erroneously, that the Cartwright article has been reinstated to article space" is misleading when you know it has since been moved back after I wrote that. I will assume your acting in good faith (Although your comments on the Janet Hall deletion page is making that harder for me to do) & perhaps you made an error in your false assertion.

MIAJudges (talk) 23:08, 2 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
As a matter of fact, I did not know one way or another, since I was not responding to your statement at the moment you wrote it. I checked to see if it was indeed up and found that it was not. As to acting in good faith, it would be good faith to strike your erroneous statement. You have not yet done so. Ravenswing 04:44, 3 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
You were not responding to my statement??? I did not see a separate paragraph for your statement. It was right under my statement & contradicting what I wrote in my statement. I wrote mine at 06:19, 1 July 2023 according to the time stamp & you wrote your statement (Once again directly under mine) at 10:28, 1 July 2023 a full 4 hours later. But I will assume good faith & perhaps it was all a coincidence.

MIAJudges (talk) 03:59, 8 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Delete; agree with Ravenswing in full. This is getting tiresome; I'd encourage certain commenters to cite policy. Iseult^Δxparlez moi 14:15, 1 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Keep - Notable per GNG, nominated doe to nom's political views. Beyond My Ken (talk) 04:18, 3 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
@Beyond My Ken How does it meet WP:GNG? I have no political agenda, I am simply tired of seeing articles created WP:TOOSOON due to WP:CRYSTAL. Let'srun (talk) 12:07, 3 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

For pity's sake, I'm a liberal. I've voted straight ticket Democrat since 1980. And I don't care if Biden, or Trump, or Emperor Joshua Norton nominated this string of hopefuls, the subject doesn't meet the GNG. Claiming that the nom is on an anti-Biden crusade is a charge requiring some very stern evidence. What's your evidence? Ravenswing 13:27, 3 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
If you have evidence, feel free to share at [[1]]. I'll just note that I also nominated [[2]] for deletion, and he is a Republican. Let'srun (talk) 17:49, 3 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 22:59, 6 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Draftify per nom (and per WP:NOTBURO, I guess). I have not been able to find more than incidental mentions in news media, related to cases over which he presided as magistrate judge or in which he argued as AUSA. But given the reasonable likelihood that NPOL will be met soon, I don't see any particular reason to make extra work for future editors by deleting the article. -- Visviva (talk) 23:07, 7 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Keep and Draftify Draftify per this discussion Snickers2686 (talk) 15:27, 11 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Relisting comment: Relisting to see if there could be a consensus to Draftify this article, as the later participants suggest.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Liz ^{Read! Talk!} 23:15, 13 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Draftify/Userfy Andre🚐 03:14, 16 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
*Keep It is difficult to understand what the debate is about. He is a current judge who is a pending nominee for Senate confirmation to the federal bench. He is notable now for that reason alone; should he be confirmed, that will make him notable by all WP:BLP criteria in perpetuity. This is a keep. Go4thProsper (talk) 11:26, 16 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Maddox does not pass WP:JUDGE as of now since he is only a magistrate judge. Let'srun (talk) 13:02, 16 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Meh: The coverage looks pretty marginal for meeting WP:GNG. And yet, his confirmation as a federal judge is imminent. So if people want to draftify this just to move it back to main space when he's confirmed, go ahead I guess. Marquardtika (talk) 19:07, 19 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Keep: Setting aside this strange crusade taking place to delete pages of federal judicial nominees currently pending before the U.S. Senate, he is a current U.S. magistrate judge for the District of Maryland. I fundamentally disagree with any reading of WP:JUDGE that discounts that service. Valadius (talk) 02:55, 21 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Keep: He is a current judge who is a pending nominee for Senate confirmation to the federal bench. I don't think that him being "just" a magistrate judge discounts him per WP:JUDGE Dusti ^{*Let's talk!*} 20:36, 21 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Relisting comment: One more relist given recent keep arguments that magistrate judges should meet WP:NJUDGE.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, _signed,Rosguill ^talk 22:07, 21 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Keep as they're already a judge with a pending nomination, and the coverage is at least trending beyond marginal. Mason (talk) 23:19, 21 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Comment: I think the best argument against considering United States magistrate judges to meet NJUDGE is found in footnote 13 to the guideline: People who satisfy this criterion will almost always satisfy the primary criterion (i.e. WP:NBASIC). That's not really true of magistrate judges in my experience. And the reason why Article III judges "almost always satisfy" NBASIC is, I would venture, precisely the confirmation process and associated politicking. (Plenty of judges happily vanish into obscurity as soon as they join the bench.) OTOH, it might be reasonable to give magistrate judgeship some weight in borderline cases, even if we don't give it conclusive weight. -- Visviva (talk) 06:52, 22 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]
Keep. I think WP:BASIC due to:

https://www.baltimoresun.com/politics/bs-md-pol-biden-baltimore-judges-20230320-amucz5rwsnhx3d343qcke4nopm-story.html. (that's behind a paywall, but you can read the content here)

Other significant coverage, but I'm not sure of their reliability:

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.