The President is announcing two new judicial nominees, both of whom are extraordinarily qualified, experienced, and devoted to the rule of law and our Constitution.
 
These choices also continue to fulfill the President’s promise to ensure that the nation’s courts reflect the diversity that is one of our greatest assets as a country — both in terms of personal and professional backgrounds.
 
For example, the President’s new nominee for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, Andre B. Mathis, would become the first Black man—and the second Black person—to sit on the Sixth Circuit from Tennessee. The last time that a Black man was confirmed to the Sixth Circuit was 24 years ago.

And the President’s new nominee to serve on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, Judge Alison J. Nathan, would be the second openly LGBT woman to serve on any federal circuit court. The first is current Second Circuit Judge Beth Robinson from Vermont, who was nominated by President Biden earlier this year and confirmed by the Senate on November 1, 2021.

This is President Biden’s tenth round of nominees for federal judicial positions, bringing the number of announced federal judicial nominees to 64.

President Biden has spent decades committed to strengthening the federal bench, which is why he continues to move rapidly to fill judicial vacancies. 

Circuit Court

 
Andre B. Mathis: Nominee for the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit
 
Andre B. Mathis is a partner in the Memphis office of the law firm Butler Snow LLP, where he has practiced since 2020. He was previously a member at the Memphis law firm Glankler Brown, PLLC, where he began his legal career as an associate in 2007. His primary practice areas have included commercial and government litigation, as well as criminal defense work. Mr. Mathis has represented numerous indigent criminal defendants through his work as a member of the Criminal Justice Act Panel for the Western District of Tennessee and his pro bono litigation with the Tennessee Innocence Project. He served on the Magistrate Judge Merit Selection Panel for the United States District Court for Western District of Tennessee from 2010 to 2011 and again from 2019 to 2020. Mr. Mathis was on the Board of Directors for Porter Goodwill Boys and Girls Club from 2008 to 2018. He also served on the Disciplinary Hearing Committee of the Tennessee Board of Professional Responsibility from 2015 to 2021 and on the Shelby County Ethics Commission from 2013 to 2017. Mr. Mathis previously served on the Federal Defender Evaluation Committee for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit from 2012 to 2013.  He previously served as President of the National Bar Association’s Ben F. Jones Chapter in 2011, and as Vice President in 2010.
 
Mr. Mathis received his J.D., cum laude, from the University of Memphis, Cecil C. Humphreys School of Law in 2007, and his B.A. from the University of Memphis in 2003.
 

Judge Alison J. Nathan: Nominee for the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit
 
Judge Alison J. Nathan has served as a United States District Court Judge for the Southern District of New York since 2011. She previously served as Special Counsel to the Solicitor General of New York from 2010 to 2011. From 2009 to 2010, Judge Nathan served in the White House Counsel’s Office as an Associate White House Counsel and Special Assistant to the President. Judge Nathan was a Fritz Alexander Fellow at New York University School of Law from 2008 to 2009 and a Visiting Assistant Professor of Law at Fordham University Law School from 2006 to 2008. From 2002 to 2006, Judge Nathan was an associate at the law firm Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr, LLP in Washington D.C. and New York. Judge Nathan served as a law clerk for United States Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens from 2001 to 2002 and for Judge Betty B. Fletcher on the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit from 2000 to 2001.
 
Judge Nathan received her J.D., magna cum laude, from Cornell Law School in 2000, and her B.A. from Cornell University in 1994.

###