Story highlights Of nearly 60 nominees, three are Asian, one is black and one is Hispanic

Judicial appointments can be a president's most enduring legacy

Trump's choices reflect a lack of racial and ethnic diversity unseen for decades

(CNN)

As President Donald Trump moves aggressively to advance a legal agenda with racial dimensions, he is simultaneously setting records for the percentage of white people nominated for lifetime appointments to the federal courts.

Of the nearly 60 individuals Trump has nominated to preside over the US justice system, only one is black. Only one is Hispanic. Trump's record, according to a CNN comparative analysis of data from the Federal Judicial Center and the US Senate, reflects a lack of racial and ethnic diversity unseen for decades.

It is difficult to consider Trump's judicial choices, which this week are continuing their steady pace through the Senate confirmation process, without the backdrop of his racially inflected comments and actions since becoming President. A case in point on Monday: His derision of Sen. Elizabeth Warren as "Pocahontas" during a White House ceremony for Navajo World War II heroes.

The portrait of Trump's judges emerges as race roils America, evident in the controversy sparked by the latest "Pocahontas" jab, the aftermath of the Charlottesville white supremacist march in August and ongoing protests by NFL players inspired by quarterback Colin Kaepernick.

Beyond Trump's rhetoric, his legal agenda includes the targeting of Harvard's affirmative action policies, withholding of federal funds from "sanctuary cities" that decline to detain and hand over certain undocumented immigrants for deportation and a travel ban focused on Muslim-majority countries. The latter two initiatives have been blocked, in full or in part, by federal judges.

Read More