April Perry – Nominee to the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois

The Dirksen Courthouse - where the Northern District of Illinois sits.

After her previous nomination be U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois stalled, April Perry has been nominated to be a U.S. District Judge on the court instead.

Background

April Perry graduated from Northwestern University in 2000 and got a J.D. magna cum laude from Northwestern University School of Law in 2003.

After graduation, Perry clerked for Judge Joel Flaum on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit. Perry then became a federal prosecutor with the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Illinois in 2004. In 2017, Perry left to become Chief Deputy State’s Attorney and Chief Ethics Officer for the Cook County State’s Attorney’s Office. In 2019, Perry left to join Ubiety Technologies as General Counsel. Since 2022, Perry serves as Senior Counsel at GE HealthCare.

History of the Seat

Perry has been nominated for a seat on the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. This seat will open upon the elevation of Judge Nancy Maldonado to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit.

Legal Career

Perry started her legal career as a law clerk for Judge Joel Flaum on the Seventh Circuit. Subsequently, Perry spent twelve years as an Assistant U.S. Attorney with the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Illinois. During this time, Perry prosecuted Gregory Patzer for bank robbery. See United States v. Patzer, 548 F. Supp. 2d 612 (N.D. Ill. 2008).

From 2017 to 2019, Perry served as the Chief Ethics Officer for Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx. Perry’s time with the office overlapped with the prosecution of Jussie Smolett for making false reports of being targeted for a hate crime. See Andy Grimm, 2 Top Deputies of State’s Attorney Foxx, One Tied to Smollett Case, To Resign, Chicago Sun Times, Apr. 18, 2019, https://chicago.suntimes.com/2019/4/18/18619800/2-top-deputies-of-state-s-attorney-foxx-one-tied-to-smollett-case-to-resign. Notably, Perry was critical of Foxx’s decision to assign the case to her First Assistant after her recusal, noting that a special prosecutor should likely have been appointed upon the recusal. See Ben Bradley, Top Foxx Official Said Recusal Wasn’t Right, WGN9, Apr. 17, 2019, https://wgntv.com/news/wgn-investigates/top-foxx-official-said-recusal-wasnt-right/. Perry subsequently resigned from the office. See Ben Bradley, Mysterious ‘Special Prosecutor Order’ Email in Smollett Case, Records Show, WGN9, Apr. 19, 2019, https://wgntv.com/news/wgn-investigates/mysterious-special-prosecutor-order-email-in-smollett-case-records-show/.

Perry has spent the last few years of her career in-house, starting with the Artificial Intelligence tech start up Ubiety Technologies, and more recently in GE HealthCare.

In 2023, Perry was nominated to be U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois. Perry’s nomination was approved by the Senate Judiciary Committee in a bipartisan 12-9 vote but was blocked by Senator J.D. Vance from a final confirmation vote, remaining pending until it was withdrawn for her nomination to the federal bench.

Overall Assessment

While Perry’s nomination to be U.S. Attorney was stalled by Vance, it is likely that Democrats will prioritize Perry’s judicial nomination more during their limited floor time. As such, ironically, Vance’s blocking of Perry’s nomination may result in a lifetime appointment for her.

187 Comments

  1. Dequan, so what I’m not clear about is whether the “President signing the commission” is actually required by the Constitution or whether it is just a ceremonial act (like the VP presiding over counting of the electoral college in Congress). One can argue that the President nominating a judge and the Senate confirming the judge has completed the process of “advice and consent”. Do you or anyone else know what the actual statute or precedent says here?

    The other question I had, and this may be more relevant actually; is if the President signing the commission is actually a mandatory part of the process, can a new Senate “expunge” the confirmation of a judge? If say Howland (or whomever) were confirmed for Jordan’s seat, the GOP takes over the Senate before the commission is signed, can the GOP vote to recind the confirmation of Howland and declare it vacant?

    Liked by 1 person

    • So the president nominating somebody constitutionally can’t be the only part that is required on his part. That is because we have seen presidents withdraw nominees. So if we used your hypothetical, a president wouldn’t be able to withdraw a nominee if his part of the deal ended after nomination. There has to be another act by the president to complete the person becoming a judge. That act is signing the commission.

      As for your second question, I previously had the same question. @Gavi gave a detailed answer but the short answer is a big fat NO. @Gavi basically said the words of the senate matter. When they say no further senate action, no intervening action, the president will be notified of the senate action & the rest of that speech they give each time a nominee is confirmed, it is closing the book on that nomination. This absolutely prevents a future senate from rescinding the confirmation. After confirmation, the only thing that can be done to stop the confirmed nominee from taking their seat is this & every future president not signing his commission for the vacant seat by the judge that left, the judge rescinds leaving the bench or the nominee deciding to no longer accept the position. I can’t think of any other reason.

      Liked by 2 people

  2. I missed the earlier discussion, so I’ll just pick up from here.

    The signing of the commission is mandatory and ceremonial. A ceremonial action is more or less subjective, so let’s stick to the mandatory aspect.

    Article II, § 3 of the Constitution says the president “… shall Commission all the Officers of the United States.” This means that every single person must receive a presidential commission in order to fulfill the duties of an officer of the US. Some of those offices require Senate confirmation first, but NEVER alone. There are court precedents affirming this understanding of the constitution, like US v. Le Baron from the mid-1800’s, I think.

    Please remember that assuming an office under the US is a 3 step process

    1: Presidential nomination/recess appointment

    2: Senate confirmation

    3: Presidential appointment (ie. the signing of the commission)

    (I am not counting oath-takings here, since that’s entirely up to the appointed person)

    Rescinding Confirmation

    I’ve written about this many times here, so I’ll just give the nickel version: Schumer says some magical words at the time of confirmation that makes this impossible. In theory, in the future the senate may not agree to table a motion to reconsider. That would be the trigger that *could* allow for the senate to vote to rescind, aka reconsider, the nomination. But every nomination is called up for a vote with this language, so it’s just academic.

    —

    @Dequan,

    I wrote the above response THEN saw that you had already posted this:

    “So the president nominating somebody constitutionally can’t be the only part that is required on his part. That is because we have seen presidents withdraw nominees. So if we used your hypothetical, a president wouldn’t be able to withdraw a nominee if his part of the deal ended after nomination. There has to be another act by the president to complete the person becoming a judge. That act is signing the commission.”

    Beautifully said and exactly so.

    Liked by 3 people

      • My favorite line from One Hundred Years of Solitude is simply “everything is known.” In this case, we just have to find the answer. These topics come up every few months are so. I think these sort of topics could go into an FAQs section of that judges site you have in mind. That way, folks can simply go there to find the answers, make updates and edits, etc.
        I’m an in the weeds nerd, especially when it comes to the minutiae of the entire judicial selection, confirmation, and appointment process, so I love these discussions. Other folks might not be so interested or may only want to know the answer as the need arises. And so a database would be good for them as a quick resource.

        Liked by 1 person

    • Hm, it looks like they may be voting out some legislation. There’s no judges that I know of who could be listed or voted out, unless any attorneys or Marshals get added on (or DOJ nominees that I’m unaware of). The next business meeting for judges would be on 6/6, which should be the holdover week for the nominees on the 5/22 hearing.

      I was hoping to find an in-depth article about the Menendez trial. All I could find was that Menendez says he intends to be at his trial every day, but nothing about the schedule or the days the trial would be held, and if the court would have any certain days off (if Trump can go around and hold rallies on the court’s off-days, Menendez can surely jet down to the Capitol for crucial votes, right?).

      Liked by 2 people

      • Ha, the only person in real life that I can talk to about the judiciary is my grandmother, she seems to have an understanding of how important it is. She did mention serving or working at the 1st Circuit up in Boston so when I told her about vacancies in that court (since that is my appeals court) at the start of Biden’s presidency (leading to Gelpi, Montecalvo, and then Rikelman), she was pretty understanding of what I was talking about. She now lives in Florida fulltime and the first time we had talked about the 11th Circuit (she knew that was her appeals court down there and that it was in Atlanta) was when the Trump appointees reversed Cannon on that special master case and how no legal expert could come up with any rational reason for why Cannon ruled the way she did. I think my first conversation about the judiciary with her was when Biden was in transition and still naming his cabinet. If I recall his AG was his last named appointee, as I speculated to her that Biden was probably waiting on the result of the Georgia runoffs and whether he’d take office with a Democratic-controlled Senate or not, in which I explained why Biden tapping Garland as AG with a Republican Senate wouldn’t be good as he’d easily be confirmed but would open up his DC Circuit seat (and explained why it’s considered the 2nd most important federal court in the country) and that McConnell would leave that seat open for 4-8 years until a Republican president got to fill it.

        Apart from that, it’s kind of a hard subject to talk about, the only federal court 95%+ of people in this country know is SCOTUS, especially if you wanted to talk to someone about the Senate’s role in confirming judges and how votes are scheduled. Most people would look at you if as if you came from living on Pluto if you started talking about filing cloture, having to vote on cloture, postcloture time, and then final confirmation vote.

        Liked by 1 person

      • Haaaaaa… That’s a wonderful story. That’s why I love this blog. There are so few people I can talk to about the judiciary so it’s great having these debates we have on here. I really wish more Americans understood how vital this subject is to their daily lives.

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  5. Going back to Sarah Netburn.

    I find it strange that no one has claimed her as their recommendation. Has this ever happened in NY before? Even when the recommended nominee originated outside of the 2 senators’ usual process, one of them eventually acknowledges the nominee as their “recommendee.” Dale Ho fell into this category (Schumer’s). Last week Schumer claimed Meredith Vacca mere hours after she was announced.

    I wonder if Netburn is entirely the WH’s candidate and was nominated merely with the blessing of the senators, without either wanting to use up their recommendation slot. Or maybe the press release claiming her just fell through the crack and it would look bad to do it belatedly.

    I guess we’ll have 2 more chances to find out: on the questionnaire and home state senator’s introduction at her hearing.

    Liked by 1 person

    • @Gavi

      I think it’s most likely the press release fell through the cracks. We likely will find out at the SJC hearing who recommended her. I just don’t see the WH going to Schumer & Gillibrand & pushing for nominee.

      Particularly one that has no apparent ties to anybody in the most inner circle of the WH (Like Dale Ho did with Ron Klain for example). Schumer & Gillibrand have hand picks every previous nominee absent Ho since Biden took office. Sarah Netburn Likely is no different, we just haven’t heard as quickly by who.

      Liked by 1 person

  8. As the Senate returns today, they’re set to vote on cloture for some State Department nomination, so no drama there. Bigger questions will be if any cloture motions today are sent out for Thursday (I’d bet against that, best-case scenario is maybe cloture is filed on Maldonado for Thursday) and what tomorrow’s schedule will look like. Since cloture was filed on Aframe last Thursday, his cloture vote can be scheduled for tomorrow (which as I mentioned in an earlier post, there has been precedent in this Congress for voting for cloture on court nominee outside of Thursday, with Abudu). Typically cloture votes on Thursday are setup the Monday or Tuesday at the start of the Senate week.

    I know there’s been speculation about maybe some deal was struck with Collins for her vote. One other factor here could be what her relationship his with her next-door colleagues in New Hampshire, and that they all share the same appeals court.

    For attendance purposes, I know some Republican Senators have decided to hang out with Trump at his trial, maybe they’ll stay up there for the week (Vance and Tuberville I know were there)? I’ve seen some speculation that it could be VP auditioning. As long as we don’t have Democratic Senators up in NY calling Menendez’s trial a witch hunt, a sham, and a hoax, we should be fine lol.

    Senate does have a Monday session next week.

    Liked by 2 people

  9. My guess isn’t that Schumer reached a “deal” with Collins per se, but rather he and Durbin got a commitment that she’ll vote yes on Aframe. Knowing that Collins is a Yes all but ensures confirmation.

    Collins has voted for about 75% of Biden’s nominees and Aframe isn’t particularly liberal or divisive. Being nominated to her home circuit likely helps too.

    Liked by 2 people

  13. Well, I guess I was wrong on this State Department nomination vote right now being drama-free, looks like it’s set to be a party-line vote (Manchin and Sinema did vote yes, Collins and Murkowski did vote no). Pretty interesting vote to kickoff a week. If Republicans are at full attendance today (which normally doesn’t happen on return days), Democrats couldn’t afford any absences with Menendez out, a second absence and the VP would need to be around.

    Liked by 1 person

  14. Wrap up complete for tonight. Looks like confirmation on Eric C. Schulte is scheduled for tomorrow. Since he in the Democrat out of the two South Dakota nominees, I am happy to see his confirmation first so he gets his commission signed first hopefully. Perhaps they will voice vote Theeler but even if they do, Schulte is older so signing the commissions the same day still gives him seniority over her.

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  15. Whitehouse wrapped up. Several nominations confirmed on voice votes (looks like another Ambassador and then board members of some commissions/boards). No cloture motions sent out but cloture on Aframe will be voted on 1:45PM Thursday.

    For tomorrow, after O’Donnell is confirmed, the Senate will vote for cloture and confirm Bulsara, and they will confirm Schulte. Would have to guess Theeler gets confirmed Thursday morning, so at least two, possibly three district court judges get confirmed this week.

    Liked by 1 person

    • Well I was thinking he might be running to force a secret pardon for Biden after the election. Remember we are talking about Menendez here so we have to think like a crooked politician. He will probably push Schumer & Biden that if he drops out of the race, a guaranteed pardon if he’s found guilty (After the election of course).

      Liked by 1 person

    • Also the weekly Alliance for Justice newsletter opened talking about the Center for Judicial Renewal promoted a list of potential Supreme Court nominees they’ve given a “green rating.” if Trump wins. They listed three names;

      James Ho

      Kyle Duncan

      Lawrence VanDyke

      Like

    • Hope I’m not jinxing this, but I’m kind of surprised that there hasn’t been any sort of renewed uproar about Aframe. I thought for sure that once Schumer filed cloture that there would have been an effort to try and derail him.. but no, they are still focused on Mangi.

      Liked by 1 person

    • I can’t even imagine a Dem senator trying to lecture or negotiate with McConnell over a blue state circuit court vacancy. I can’t imagine because it wouldn’t happen lololol.

      McConnell would just flash that goofy ass old man smile and tell the home-state senators to bend over and prepare to take it. Incoming 35-year-old FedSoc hack former Thomas clerk with a “NQ” rating from the ABA. And I promise you that not one single senator besides Collins (She’d be “concerned” about the declining bipartisanship, then vote to confirm whoever was nominated) would utter a word in opposition. A GOP senate is a judicial confirmation factory for right-wing hacks, and we have to pray that Dem senators stay in line. Ugh

      Which just makes me madder is the fact that we couldn’t get a 37-year-old SPLC/ACLU lawyer in Texas to give the biggest “eff you” to Cruz and Cornyn. I guess the few district court judges in Texas Biden got was worth it, but still… I just want payback.

      Liked by 1 person

      • Nothing would have pleased me more than Rochelle Garza to have been nominated to the 5th. Or at least Amparo Monique Guerra & 5 of the 8 district court seats filled with Democrats and/or Independents. Then nominate Lee Merritt for the next vacancy. Ted Cruz head might literally explode at the SJC hearing had that dream happened… Lol

        Liked by 1 person

  19. Oof, what a nightmare rotation. Unfortunately I think hardline combative conservatives will be the norm going forward under any future GOP administration

    If Biden is re elected, those three will probably age out of consideration but there are plenty others waiting in the pipeline

    Liked by 2 people

    • Not surprised by any of them. Ho would be the first Asian-American justice — while Duncan and VanDyke are white men, now that Barrett & KBJ are on the court, the GOP won’t have any in-party pressure to appoint a woman or POC. Until KBJ, there would have definitely been pressure within the GOP to replace Thomas with another African-American.

      Although Matthew Kacsmaryk has been on longer lists, I don’t think they will pick him because he’s useful to them as a single-judge division. This is also why I think Reed O’Connor was not picked to the 5th circuit — before Trump, Reed O’Connor was the right’s go to judge (such as when he struck down the ACA).

      Now, something interesting is who Trump/GOP would appoint if they were subject to a Democratic-controlled Senate. This probably won’t happen anytime super soon given Senate malapportionment (50 seats is pretty much Dems’ ceiling in 2025 so they would need the VP to control the Senate). It is a fact that Chuck Schumer (or pretty much anyone in Dem leadership) would not outright stop judicial confirmations the way Turtle did in 2015-16. However, Senate Dems aren’t about to let the GOP fill the courts with FedSoc hacks if they can do anything about it. I would expect that Dems would go more hardline than they did in 07-08 (in 07-08, they had a bare 51 seat majority with several Manchin-prototypes such as Ben Nelson, Robert Byrd, Mark Pryor, & Joe Lieberman). In this case I would guess they would go with mostly center-right types (if Trump cared about ideological purity, he could outright refuse to nominate judges in a Dem senate, but he cares more about his count).

      Liked by 1 person

  20. One other thing I noticed is that Kent A. Jordan plans on outright retiring on January 15, not taking senior status. He needs all the time possible to get his cases out, though he could always take senior status on December 31 and then outright retire when he’s done disposing of his cases. Perhaps he doesn’t like the idea of senior status (this was the reason why Richard Posner outright retired).

    Liked by 1 person

    • Though if Trump wins and Jordan isn’t done with his cases by Jan. 15, I think he would go senior on Jan. 15 and then retire once he’s done disposing of his cases.

      I suppose Biden could also make a secret deal with Jordan where Jordan agrees to move up his retirement date and in exchange Jordan gets some degree of say in who his successor is.

      Liked by 1 person

    • The retirement is good, as it means one less conservative on the bench (likely would have contributed heavily as a senior for at least a decade), and to me means he a) wants to be a full-time grandpa, b) wants to take a leadership role in the church, and/or c) he’s been offered a lucrative role by one of the many Delaware-based companies.

      Liked by 1 person

      • Most likely option C. That retirement check for life will go nice with a big law firm check. He won’t get ethe cost of living increases since he is retiring but I’m sure he can make that up in a day or two of work each year at a big law firm.

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