When the United States Senate returned to work in early September after its summer recess, it faced a daunting in-tray. The nation’s coronavirus death toll has exceeded 1,000 people on several days this month and many of the emergency economic measures to deal with the crisis have expired.

But with the parties divided over new economic stimulus, Senate Republicans have continued instead with the quiet task that has preoccupied them for much of Donald Trump’s presidency: placing young and reliably conservative judges on the federal courts.

More than a dozen district judges have been installed into lifetime positions in September alone, part of Mr Trump’s near-record first-term tally of 217 judicial appointments.