Sonia Sotomayor

Sonia Maria Sotomayor (Spanish: [ˈsonja sotomaˈʝoɾ]; born June 25, 1954) is an American lawyer and jurist who serves as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. She was nominated by President Barack Obama on May 26, 2009, and has served since August 8, 2009. She is the third woman U.S. Supreme Court justice.

Sotomayor was born in the Bronx, New York City, to Puerto Rican-born parents. Her father died when she was nine years old, and she was subsequently raised by her mother. She graduated with high honors from Princeton University in 1976 and received her Juris Doctor in 1979 from Yale Law School, where she was an editor of the Yale Law Journal. She worked as an assistant district attorney in New York for four and a half years before entering private practice in 1984. She played an active role on the boards of directors for the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund, the State of New York Mortgage Agency, and the New York City Campaign Finance Board.

President George H. W. Bush nominated Sotomayor to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York in 1991; she was confirmed in 1992. In 1997, President Bill Clinton nominated her to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. That appointment was slowed by the Republican majority in the United States Senate because of its concerns that the position might lead to a Supreme Court nomination, but she was confirmed in 1998. On the Second Circuit, Sotomayor heard appeals in more than 3,000 cases and wrote about 380 opinions. Sotomayor has taught at the New York University School of Law and Columbia Law School.

In May 2009, President Obama nominated Sotomayor to the Supreme Court following Justice David Souter's retirement. Her nomination was confirmed by the Senate in August 2009 by a vote of 68–31. While on the Court, Sotomayor has supported the informal liberal bloc of justices when they divide along the commonly perceived ideological lines. During her Supreme Court tenure, Sotomayor has been identified with concern for the rights of criminal defendants and criminal justice reform, as demonstrated in majority opinions such as J. D. B. v. North Carolina and Glossip v. Oklahoma. She is also known for her impassioned dissents on issues of race and ethnic identity, including in Schuette v. BAMN, Utah v. Strieff, and Trump v. Hawaii.