A Miami Cuban American who worked for both Jeb Bush and George W. Bush was nominated to fill a vacancy on the state Supreme Court, in response to the governor's insistence that the list of nominees be more diverse.

Frank Jimenez, currently general counsel for the Navy, was added to the list Wednesday after a contentious, late-night meeting of the Judicial Nominating Commission in which members questioned Gov. Charlie Crist's motives and the fairness of the process.

Jimenez, a graduate of the University of Miami and Yale Law School, worked for the former governor as a deputy chief of staff, deputy general counsel, and acting general counsel for nearly four years. He took a leave of absence from his duties to work for President Bush during the fight over Florida's election recount in 2000.

He also was chief of staff to Sen. Mel Martinez when Martinez was director of the Department of Housing and Urban Development. His brother, Marcos Jimenez, was U.S. Attorney in Miami from 2002 to 2005.

He applied for two previous vacancies but his name didn't make the list of nominees.

Gov. Charlie Crist sent back the first list the JNC sent him to fill the seat of Justice Harry Lee Anstead, 71, who is retiring Jan. 5. Crist said he wanted a more diverse set of choices after he appointed the only Hispanic on the list, Jorge Labarga, to the Fourth District Court of Appeal.

On the list: 5th District Court of Appeal Judge C. Alan Lawson of Daytona Beach and Circuit Judges Kevin Emas of Miami, Waddell Wallace III of Jacksonville, and Gill Freeman of Miami, the lone woman. None is black. For weeks, the legal community had been buzzing about a behind-the-scenes push for Jimenez, who declined to comment Thursday.

Crist, asked about those who believe there was a ''fix'' for Jimenez, responded: ``They're going to be surprised. . . . those are prejudgments and they're premature.''

During the JNC meeting, member Arturo Alvarez echoed some of the concerns in the legal community and suggested Crist wasn't too wedded to diversity.

''I believed in diversity long before it was politically popular. He's basically saying: Send me another Cuban American . . . '' said Alvarez, a Coral Gables attorney who was appointed to his first nominating commission by Democratic Gov. Lawton Chiles.

''We should avoid the perception that our choices are influenced by the governor, regardless of his motivations,'' Alvarez said. ``Diversity doesn't mean: `I want a specific person.'''

Marty Garcia, a Crist appointee, quickly shot back: ``Nobody's asking for a specific person.''

The wrangling among the nine members -- eight are lawyers -- continued, with those appointed by Crist squaring off against holdovers from prior administrations. Some questioned whether they could send up a new nominee. Others argued they had to because the governor requested it. JNC member Katherine Ezell said she thought ``the procedure was improper.''

Jimenez was criticized by fellow lawyers in 1999 when he proposed in an e-mail to other Jeb Bush staffers that they figure out a way to find more ''ideologically compatible'' judicial nominees. Jimenez also worked for Bush when the Republican-led Legislature in 2001 shifted power to the governor and away from the Florida Bar in the selection of JNC members.

While some in the legal community -- including Cuban-American Republicans -- privately criticized the nominating process and worried Jimenez wasn't the most qualified candidate, others said he would be an ideal justice.

Rebekah Poston, Jimenez's former boss at the law firm Steel Hector Davis in Miami, said that based on the work he did for her, Jimenez would be an excellent choice for the Supreme Court. ''He was a superb writer, superb researcher and his ethics were beyond reproach,'' she said. ``He was able to look at both sides of issues.''

Alvin Davis, also formerly of Steel Hector Davis, agreed. ''He has strong views, which I think people should have, but he does not let those views interfere with what he is called upon to do,'' he said. ``We disagreed politically on just about everything. We had vigorous political debates, and it did not interfere with his work for me one bit.''

Jimenez's political adversaries were among the people who wrote to the commission recommending him.

Harold Koh, the dean of the Yale Law School and a critic of the current Bush administration, wrote: ``We may agree about very few political issues, but he is utterly fair-minded and reasonable, careful in his legal analysis, thorough in his research, committed in his argument and honest in his character.''

There have been no Hispanics on the seven-member high court since Raoul Cantero resigned earlier this year. One justice is black and two are women.

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