I’m reliably informed that President Obama is on the verge of nominating NAACP Legal Defense Fund lawyer Debo P. Adegbile to the D.C. Circuit.

Adegbile has worked for the NAACP Legal Defense Fund since 2001. Before that, he was a litigation associate at the Paul Weiss law firm for seven years. From what I understand, both of his jobs have been in New York City. I gather that he is 42 or so.

I confess that I had never heard of Adegbile. I find it odd that, as with his previous nomination of Caitlin Halligan, Obama has seen fit to select for the D.C. Circuit a New York lawyer with no significant background in federal administrative law (and no judicial experience to offset that deficiency). I guess that there just aren’t any good Democratic lawyers in D.C.

This may well be a pick more designed to excite Obama’s left-wing base than to produce a confirmation.