Melissa DuBose – Nominee to the U.S. District Court for the District of Rhode Island

Nominated nearly a year before the seat she is seeking to fill opens, Rhode Island Judge Melissa DuBose is poised to become the first judge of color and first judge from the LGBTQ community on the Rhode Island federal district court.

Background

A native Rhode Islander, Melissa DuBose was born in 1968 and attended Providence College, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1990. DuBose subsequently spent a decade working as a high school teacher before getting her law degree from Roger Williams School of Law in 2004.

After graduating, DuBose joined the Rhode Island Attorney General’s Office under then Attorney General Sheldon Whitehouse (now a U.S. Senator and a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee). In 2019, DuBose became in-house counsel for Schneider Electric. Since 2019, DuBose has served as a judge on the Rhode Island District Court in Providence.

History of the Seat

DuBose has been nominated for a vacancy on the U.S. District Court for the District of Rhode Island. This seat will open on January 1, 2025, when Judge William Smith takes senior status.

Legal Experience

After spending a decade as a high school history and civics teacher, DuBose went to law school after one of her students committed a murder as part of a gang fight. After law school, DuBose worked as a special assistant attorney for the Rhode Island Attorney General’s Office, prosecuting juveniles.

From 2009 to 2019, DuBose worked on ethics and corporate compliance in-house with Schneider Electric, an energy company based out of France.

Jurisprudence

In 2018, Gov. Gina Raimondo (now the Secretary of Commerce) appointed DuBose to the Rhode Island District Court. DuBose was subsequently confirmed to the court in 2019, where she has served as a trial judge since, presiding over both civil and criminal cases. DuBose is also a member of the Committee on Racial and Ethnic Fairness in Rhode Island Courts and is chair of the Public Engagement and Education subcommittee.

In addition to her time as a judge, DuBose also serves on the Board of Directors for the Roger Williams University School of Law, and chairs the Board’s Diversity & Inclusion Committee.

Political Activity

DuBose has a relatively brief political history, with small donations to Democrats Angel Taveras and Joseph Fernandez.

Overall Assessment

In Whitehouse, DuBose’s historic nomination has a powerful ally on its side. While she is likely to draw a number of questions regarding her views regarding diversity and inclusion in the court system, Whitehouse’s support should ensure a smooth and on-track confirmation for DuBose.

176 Comments

  1. Zack's avatar

    James Mackler sounds like a good candidate for Gibbons seat if he wants to take it.
    For Stranch’s seat, I say we find another Mathis or liberal and tell Blackburn and Hagerty to once again take their blue slips and shove em.
    As to that NY Times article about Biden slowing with nominations etc.. should note in some cases you can’t keep up with Trump if the vacancies aren’t there.
    We need to see a few more retirements in the next few weeks.
    Whether we’ll get them however is another question.

    Liked by 2 people

    • Hank's avatar

      I doubt Blackburn will return a blue slip for anyone with criminal defense experience – at best, she might OK Mackler as Stranch’s replacement if she gets a Republican to replace Gibbons. Otherwise, I don’t think he’s a likely candidate.

      Even though Mackler is basically a Tennessee version of Federico, the Collins/Murk/Graham trio would likely vote no on him out of courtesy to Blackburn if she refuses to return a blue slip (like they did with Mathis). John Kennedy’s also not going to save him like he did with Mathis because Kennedy hates anyone with criminal defense experience. Lastly, although there’s an argument for having an East Tennessee-based judge, Gibbons is unlikely to react positively to having her seat moved to Nashville (which already has a circuit seat).

      Liked by 1 person

  3. Zack's avatar

    On a different note, Joshua Kolar will be confirmed tomorrow.
    We’ll have to wait and see what type of judge he’ll be but as has been pointed out already, some nominees we thought would be uber liberal haven’t been while others have been more progressive then we thought they would be.
    Time will tell.
    At the very least, he will be far better then the man he is replacing.

    Liked by 2 people

    • Ryan J's avatar

      Out of the circuit courts, I’d say the 7th is one that I’m more familiar with, after only the 9th (my home circuit court) and maybe the 5th.

      After Kolar’s confirmation, a list of judges (from most liberal to most conservative):
      Jackson-Akiwumi, Rovner, Pryor, Lee, Kolar, St. Eve, Easterbrook, Scudder, Sykes, Brennan, Kirsch

      Let me know whether you agree with this ordering or whether you would change it.

      Liked by 1 person

      • Zack's avatar

        Sans voting right issues or gun control, I haven’t seen them do it either.
        Your list looks pretty accurate to me.
        I do think sans St. J Eve on a couple of issues, there really isn’t that much of a difference between the different conservatives on the court, as they are all hostile to LGBT rights, voting rights etc.

        Liked by 2 people

      • Hank's avatar

        Not sure what the basis for the comment about Lee barely being liberal is – he was a pretty standard liberal on NDIL, and his dissents on CA7 so far have shown a more liberal jurisprudence (on election law, consumer law/standing, and prisoner’s rights) than the conservative majority on those panels. I also don’t remember seeing any dissents from a liberal judge on any of Lee’s opinions, whereas Hamilton has dissented once from a Pryor opinion and expressed a willingness to take a more expansive (pro-plaintiff) view of the ADA in another.

        I’d switch Lee and Pryor from Ryan’s initial list. Scudder is pretty close to St Eve on most things (St Eve seems more conservative on criminal/racial discrimination issues, while Scudder is very pro-Second Amendment), so I’d switch him and Easterbrook (though Easterbrook is a bit unpredictable at times). Honestly can’t tell the difference between Sykes/Brennan/Kirsch – they’re pretty much anll equally hardcore conservative/crazy.

        Hopefully Kolar will be more liberal than his resume suggests, but as of right now, I think St Eve/Scudder will be the deciding what goes en banc on CA7 (which rarely happens). Hopefully that means CA7 remains relatively sane despite having a Republican majority.

        Liked by 2 people

      • Aiden's avatar

        From what I’ve seen Lee is a left of centre moderate Judge.

        I’m confused to your reference on progressive election law jurisprudence for Lee.

        In his concurrence in the election law case,
        Barbara Tully v. Paul Okeson. He would not of held at the appellate level that the statute allowing elderly people an extension of time to vote absentee was constitutional. Instead remanding it to the district court.
        That’s not a progressive opinion.

        However, his dissent in Delores Henry v. Russell Reynolds, does seem liberal. However, Easterbrooks opinion seemed to suggest that unlike other circuits they were bound by tough precedent for the plaintiff, that the Jury had already come back on a part of the case and that he had to defer to the Supreme Court, for any changes.
        Easterbrooks opinion Was 3 pages and was hardly conservative.

        I don’t see anything so far showing him to be a liberal similar to Wood.

        However I agree very much on Pryor likely being more conservative, I am unsure whether she is even that left of centre. Two times now she has came out with a more conservative interpretation than Hamilton.

        Liked by 2 people

      • Hank's avatar

        @Aiden I’m not following your reading of Tully. The case was about whether allowing *only* older voters (and thus not younger voters) to vote absentee was constitutional. Lee’s remand would’ve been for the plaintiffs to show that they (as younger voters) suffered a hardship from not being permitted to vote absentee solely because of their age. Not sure how that isn’t a liberal conclusion (especially compared with the majority’s holding that it’s fine to deny younger voters a voting method) – the Indiana law in question is nakedly partisan in that it makes it easier for Republican-leaning groups (old people) to vote but denies the same right to Dem-leaning groups (younger people).

        Not sure what your point is on the other case – the analysis and dissent showed that Lee reached the liberal result in that case, and the length/bad reasoning of whatever BS Easterbrook wrote doesn’t change that.

        My guess based on Lee’s background is that he’s unlikely to be as progressive on criminal issues in particular as Jackson-Akiwumi for example, but that’s just a hunch and there’s not really data to support that at this point.

        But I agree that the early data us suggesting that Pryor is more moderate than at least Hamilton. Hamilton himself isn’t even that liberal, as (in one of his worst decisions as a CA7 judge) he kept Brendan Dassey from Making a Murder imprisoned despite obvious evidence that Dassey’s confession was coerced (honestly not sure how Hamilton sleeps at night with that one). Pryor’s still left of the median judge on CA7 though, so any difference isn’t likely to matter in many cases.

        Liked by 2 people

  6. Aiden's avatar

    I am not sure if this was covered. It now looks like both Austin and Lund have received their commissions, just waiting on the two Hawaii designates to receive theirs.

    Does anyone know why theirs are both taking so long?

    Like

  8. Zack's avatar

    I will say after the Brennan debacle in which he was allowed to flip a liberal seat that had been open for four years among others that any seat that opens up now is going to get filled instead of letting a flip happen down the line.
    Who that will be is another question of course.

    Like

  9. star0garnet's avatar

    I was curious about the outcomes of circuit appointments broken down by age. So I looked at all circuit judges appointed since 1977, excluding Charles Pickering (expired recess appointment) and double-counting Roger Gregory as a D and R appointee.

    Below is a cross-tabulation of appointing party and age at commission vs. 1) leaving active bench under D (minus exceptions below), 2) leaving active bench under R (minus exceptions below), 3) dying on active bench or leaving active bench and dying before the next presidential election, 4) SCOTUS elevations, and 5) outcome tbd (not included in percentages). (Those that left the active bench in November or later of a presidential year are grouped with the next presidential term.):

    D, 35-40: 1 (33%), 2 (67%), 0 (0%), 0 (0%), 1
    R, 35-40: 3 (43%), 3 (43%), 0 (0%), 1 (14%), 9
    D, 40-45: 10 (63%), 2 (13%), 3 (13%), 2 (13%), 12
    R, 40-45: 7 (37%), 8 (42%), 1 (5%), 3 (16%), 26
    D, 45-50: 18 (69%), 4 (15%), 3 (12%), 1 (4%), 28
    R, 45-50: 14 (39%), 15 (42%), 4 (11%), 3 (8%), 23
    D, 50-55: 23 (74%), 4 (13%), 2 (6%), 2 (6%), 24
    R, 50-55: 18 (42%), 23 (53%), 2 (5%), 0 (0%), 22
    D, 55-60: 20 (51%), 12 (31%), 7 (18%), 0 (0%), 14
    R, 55-60: 19 (53%), 12 (33%), 5 (14%), 0 (0%), 8
    D, 60-65: 9 (45%), 9 (45%), 2 (10%), 0 (0%), 1
    R, 60-65: 1 (14%), 6 (86%), 0 (0%), 0 (0%), 1
    D, 65-70: 1 (100%), 0 (0%), 0 (0%), 0 (0%), 0
    R, 65-70: 0 (0%), 1 (100%), 0 (0%), 0 (0%), 1

    Positive outcomes controlled by the judge by age at commission:
    35-40: D 33% of 3; R 57% of 7
    40-45: D 75% of 16; R 58% of 19
    45-50: D 73% of 26; R 50% of 36
    50-55: D 81% of 31; R 53% of 43
    55-60: D 51% of 39; R 33% of 36
    60-65: D 45% of 20; R 86% of 7
    65-70: D 100% of 2; R 100% of 1

    So positive outcomes controlled by the judge have peaked for Ds from 40-55, and for Rs from 60-70. Outcomes were worst for Ds from 55-65 and Rs from 55-60. Most of the previous sentence can be explained by blue slip compromise candidates that didn’t align ideologically with their appointer, but I’m not sure all of it can. The R peak is interesting; perhaps they only appoint older judges that they’re particularly confident in. That positive outcomes for Rs are so much lower from 40-55 than for Ds is also interesting; I’m not sure of the explanation there.

    Percentage of appointees by president who were younger
    than 55 at commission, plus stats:
    Biden: 82% (32/39), avg. 48.9, med. 48.8
    Trump: 91% (49/54), avg. 47.7, med. 47.0
    Obama: 60% (33/55), avg. 53.0, med. 52.8
    GW Bush: 77% (47/61), avg. 50.8, med. 51.2
    Clinton: 67% (44/66), avg. 52.5, med. 51.5
    GHW Bush: 79% (33/42), avg. 49.7, med. 49.9
    Reagan: 69% (57/83), avg. 50.6, med. 51.1
    Carter: 55% (31/56), avg. 52.5, med. 53.7

    Liked by 2 people

    • Dequan's avatar

      @star0garnet

      Great info as always. I know in your analysis you mentioned blue slip compromises (Pre Trump of course). I would also like to add in the filibuster pre-Harry Reid invoking the nuclear option. You could have a blue state with a Democrat president (Or red state with a Republican president) & they still may have nominated an older or more outer-party friendly judge compared to what we would see post Trump.

      So using present day examples, I give Ramirez a F under Biden. Had she been a nominee pre-Reid going nuclear even if she was 59 then, I would have likely given her a C if not higher.

      Liked by 1 person

      • star0garnet's avatar

        Outside of MAGA true believers, probably upwards of 80% of politically informed people would have guessed Hillary was going to beat Trump, particularly 3+ months before the election. That assumption is why the election turned out they way it did. So I’d guess that most that retired/went senior that congress thought they’d be replaced by a Dem even if McConnell held the seat open that congress; at the very least they gambled upon having a Dem replace them.

        That congress is, I’d guess, almost solely responsible for the trend of ‘senior upon confirmation of successor’ trend. And until that trend arose, there wasn’t much that a judge could do besides determining the timing of their exit. So in the data above, “positive outcomes controlled by the judge,” =/= positive result for their efforts or vice versa, although they are strongly aligned.

        Liked by 2 people

  11. Ryan J's avatar

    @CJ here is my list for the 9th.

    I divide them into blocs but within a bloc I’m ordering them from most liberal to most conservative.

    Most liberal (1-6): Sung, Wardlaw, Koh, Sanchez, Mendoza, Desai

    Liberal (7-10): Friedland, Murguia, Christen, de Alba

    Moderate liberal (11-13): H. Thomas, Nguyen, Johnstone

    True moderate (14-17): Gould, Rawlinson, Owens, M. Smith

    Moderate conservative (18-21): Miller, Bennett, Forrest, Bade

    Conservative (22-25): Bress, Callahan, Ikuta, Lee

    Ultra-conservative (26-29): R. Nelson, Bumatay, Collins, VanDyke

    Liked by 1 person

    • Dequan's avatar

      I would probably move Sanchez & Mendoza more into the liberal category & move Desai up a little. I hope Thomas moves up higher on the list in the near future.

      I definitely think M. Smith is more conservative than a true moderate. I would flip flop him & Bennett at least. I might move R. Nelson to just conservative.

      Liked by 1 person

    • Hank's avatar

      Not enough data to tell on de Alba yet, to be honest. Would say Holly Thomas is a liberal rather than a moderate liberal, as the published decisions she’s joined or written (including a recent immigrant-friendly one) seem more liberal than some of the unpublished memdispo’s she’s joined.

      Milan Smith is a moderate conservative, as are Miller and Bennett. Bade and Forrest aren’t moderate, but also not inflammatory – they might be the only ones in a general “conservative” category. Everyone you currently have in the “conservative group” is very conservative, and I don’t know if they’ve joined any “liberal” opinions recently (if ever).

      Ryan Nelson is batshit crazy. Definitely belongs in the hard-right group along with the others you have.

      Liked by 2 people

      • Ryan J's avatar

        There is actually at least one case that separates the very conservative judges from the batshit crazy ones.

        Click to access 22-15378.pdf

        Take this Department of Labor case. The Dept. of Labor sued company owners who sold their stock at an allegedly inflated value. 3 conservative judges (Judges Lee, Collins, and Senior Judge Bea) all affirmed the decision to throw out the lawsuit. However, Lee and Bea ruled that the government’s position was substantially justified. Collins partially dissented, and argued that the government was doing this in bad faith.

        Liked by 1 person

  12. Dequan's avatar

    I know we have spoke extensively about missing a SJC hearing slot because of a lack of nominees. I’m getting concerned we may miss a hearing because of a lack of announced nominees being sent to the senate. SJC rules state they need to post a hearing a week in advance. The nominees from the last batch still haven’t been sent to the senate for some reason. This Wednesday would be 3 weeks since they were announced & a week before the next hearing slot.

    I’m not sure what SJC rules are regarding this subject but the last batch was all blue states & DC so if there’s any rules SJC Republicans can extort to delay a hearing I’m sure they will. I really hope we don’t get anywhere near that scenario & the WH just finally sends the nominations to the senate tomorrow or Wednesday. For God’s sake what can the hold up be, can they not find a stamp???

    Like

  13. Zack's avatar

    I would have Rawlinson listed as a conservative Democrat.
    As someone who is a member of the LGBT community, I still can’t forget the very ugly dissent she was a part of during the battle over marriage equality in the U.S. and the fact she put her name alongside Judge O’Scannlain and Judge Bea (biggest anti-LGBT judges on the 9th) to say that same sex couples being discriminated against had no business coming to the courts for help along with denials of asylum to some LGBT seekers makes it clear that even if she is liberal/moderate on other issues, she is very anti-LGBT and you can’t call someone like that a moderate.
    I remember her being floated, albeit as a long shot candidate to SCOTUS under Obama.
    Thank goodness that never happened.
    Now if she would take senior status, that would be great.

    Liked by 3 people

  14. Aiden's avatar

    Here’s the changes I would make:

    Most liberal; Sung, Mendoza and Desai.

    Extremely Liberal: Wardlaw and Koh

    Very Liberal: Sanchez and Murguia

    Liberal: Friedland,
    H.A Thomas and Christen

    Moderate liberals: Nguyen, Johnstone, Gould, Rawlinson

    True moderate: Owens and M. Smith

    Moderate conservative (18-21): Miller, Bennett, Forrest

    Conservative (22-25): Callahan, Ikuta, Bade and Lee

    Ultra-conservative (26-29): R. Nelson, Bumatay, Collins, VanDyke and Bress

    Bade: Joins the en banc conservative dissents nearly all the time. Miller, Bennett and Forrest don’t often join the very conservative ones. I think she has become more conservative over time.

    Rawlinson: She joined the progressive dissent in the Geo Group en banc case. She seems to be just more conservative on criminal issues.

    Bress: Seems to join all the en banc dissents. In oral arguments he often makes shots at liberals, not to the level Van Dyke previously did. He is similar to Bumatay in my opinion. I do think Van Dyke is a lot more collegial now, he was even in an article speaking highly of his liberal colleagues.

    Mendoza: Is more liberal than Sanchez we have seen this through them ending up on opposite sides of multiple cases. E.g qualified immunity and Habeas Corpus.

    Desai: She dissented from a disposition by H.A Thomas and Koh. Desai argued for a more progressive and lenient pleading standard in Anti Trust decisions.
    Also I think in oral arguments recently Sung appeared more progressive and disagreed slightly with fellow panel member Judge Koh.

    Murguia: I was tempted to make even more liberal. She has joined all the en banc opinions on the progressive side. I do think there may have been one or two rehearing dissents she didn’t join though.

    Johnstone: Has very good jurisprudence on immigration cases so far, Bress has dissented a few times as well from his dispositions. Good signs for him.

    De Alba: I expect to be very liberal hopefully similar to Mendoza and at least more liberal than Sanchez.

    Wardlaw: I believe she is more conservative than Judge Koh, but I kept them together. Just as I didn’t feel Koh was that super progressive level of Mendoza and Sung.

    It was hard to keep to the grouping system

    Liked by 2 people

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