Judge Sanket Bulsara – Nominee to the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York

A longtime litigator and federal magistrate judge, Judge Sanket Bulsara is poised to join the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York.

Background

Born in 1977 in the Bronx, Sanket Bulsara graduated magna cum laude from Harvard College in 1998 and then attended Harvard Law School, graduating in 2002. Bulsara then clerked for Judge John Koeltl on the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.

After his clerkship, Bulsara spent a year at the Los Angeles office of Munger Tolles & Olson LLP before joining Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale & Dorr LLP. He stayed there, becoming a Partner in 2012, until 2015 (however, Bulsara also spent six months as a Special Assistant District Attorney at the Kings County District Attorney’s Office.

In 2015, Bulsara became Deputy General Counsel at the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, and subsequently became Acting General Counsel in January 2017.

In 2017, Bulsara became a federal magistrate judge on the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York. He serves on that court today.

History of the Seat

Bulsara has been nominated to fill a seat on the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York. This seat will open on December 19, 2024 when Judge Joan Azrack moves to senior status.

Legal Career

Bulsara started his legal career by clerking on the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. After a year at Munger Tolles, Bulsara then worked at Wilmer Hale for a decade. Among the cases he worked on there, Bulsara represented Viviana Vittori, who was defending against the forced return of her children to Italy, where her ex-husband had moved. See Ermini v. Vittori, 758 F.3d 153 (2d Cir. 2014).

Between 2015 and 2017, Bulsara worked at the Securities and Exchange Commission, where he was part of the legal team working on the enforcement actions brought against Charles Kokesh for misappropriation of funds. See SEC v. Kokesh, 834 F.3d 1158 (10th Cir. 2016), rev’d by Kokesh v. SEC, 137 S. Ct. 1635 (U.S. 2017). Bulsara also worked on enforcement actions against John Saad on misappropriation allegations. See Saad v. SEC, 873 F.3d 297 (D.C. Cir. 2017).

Notably, Bulsara was part of the legal team representing the SEC before the Supreme Court defending proceedings against Bassam Salman, who was indicted for insider trading for trading based on information received from his brother-in-law. See Salman v. United States, 137 S. Ct. 420 (U.S. 2016). The Supreme Court unanimously affirmed Salman’s conviction. See id.

Jurisprudence

Bulsara has served as a U.S. Magistrate Judge since his appointment in 2017. As a magistrate judge, Bulsara handles matters related to pretrial release, warrants, and discovery, handles cases by consent, and presides over settlement conferences. During his time as a magistrate judge, Bulsara has also issued over 300 opinions.

Among the opinions he has written, Bulsara has:

  • Dismissed a defamation claim brought by a solo practitioner alleging that a blog post written by opposing counsel was defamatory. See Wexler v. Dorsey & Whitney, 18-CV-3066-SJB (E.D.N.Y. 2019) (available at https://digitalcommons.law.scu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3064&context=historical);
  • Granted a motion to compel medical records of the plaintiff, finding that the plaintiff had put her medical condition at issue in the case. See Vargas v. United States, 401 F. Supp. 3d 346 (E.D.N.Y. 2018);
  • Granted a motion to compel arbitration of a Fair Labor Standards Act claim. See Vargas v. Bay Terrace Plaza LLC., 378 F. Supp. 3d 190 (E.D.N.Y. 2019);
  • Granted a motion to exclude a defendant’s expert witness for failure to make inadequate disclosures under the federal rules. See Piepes v. Nai Entertainment Holdings LLC., 394 F. Supp. 3d 315 (E.D.N.Y. 2019).

Political Activity

While at Wilmer Hale, Bulsara made a number of political donations, including to President Barack Obama and then Senator Hillary Clinton.

Overall Assessment

Despite his youth, Bulsara has built up a legal career with extensive experience in the law, including as a practitioner and as a judge. His confirmation should be relatively straightforward.

159 Comments

  1. Ryan J's avatar

    AliKhan missing the chief judge spot by 4 days will almost certainly be rectified. Both Ali and Sooknanan are young enough to be chief judge, so there would be a Biden chief judge even if one of the two isn’t confirmed/steps down early/gets elevated.

    Liked by 1 person

    • Dequan's avatar

      Once Ali & Sooknanan are confirmed, I think the DC district court will be the first court in the country with four judges born in the 1980’s. In contrast, the CDCA, SDNY & EDNY only have one judge born in the 1980’s combined (Natasha Merle). Really good job in DC.

      Like

      • Dequan's avatar

        Just goes to show you how much work the senate Democrats have to do when it comes to recommending young progressives. The fact that if all four CDCA vacancies are filled with judges born in the 1980’s, the 28 judges on that court would only tie the 13 judges on the C district court. So many missed opportunities despite Biden being the best president ever when it comes to nominating young progressives.

        There are 20 district court vacancies left that don’t have a Republican senator able to block the nominee with blue slips & 5 circuit court vacances. Out of the 25 seats, if we could get double digit nominees born 1980 or later, I would be happy.

        Liked by 1 person

  2. Mike's avatar

    I’m not very impressed with the AZ nominees, they don’t seem to have a progressive, criminal defense or civil rights history but I’ll take Dequans high grades as evidence they’re not as bad as it seems for two blue senators.

    Liked by 1 person

    • Dequan's avatar

      I gave the Arizona nominees a B+ & A-. So I agree with you there were certainly more progressive possibilities. I think they were good but not great like the Arizona judge we got for the 9th who I gave an A+ for.

      I gave them a bit extra on my grade because of the judges they are replacing. 2 of the 3 judges taking senior status are Republicans & the one Democrat was in his 60’s when Obama nominated him so both of the woman nominated today are big time upgrades regardless of what seat they eventually get nominated for.

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  3. aangren's avatar

    https://www.forthedefensepodcast.com/
    40 minute interview with judge nancy abudu on her time on the 11th circuit thus far, she announces her gratitude to biden for being serious about appointing diverse judges to the court and for sticking through it, she talks about her confirmation hearing, she talks about how she still pinches herself when she goes to the courthouse and there is an assigned parking space for her and people call her job. She talks about her appreciation for the chief judge pryor and his writing style and how she has grown close to her predecessor martin since she came on the bench, alots more as well.

    Liked by 1 person

  4. Zack's avatar

    Just saw on the U.S. judicial site that Camela Theeler has been nominated to Judge Viken’s seat even though it’s likely she is going to stay in Sioux Falls.
    Likely means Eric Schulte will be the one going to Rapid City if someone has to move.
    On a different note, after the two FL nominees get confirmed, I hope we see movement on the Circuit court nominees but it won’t shock me if we see the last NJ or UT district court nominees get movement on them given that they are judicial emergencies (Viken’s seat is as well now which is why I suspect we finally got a deal on the South Dakota seats.)

    Liked by 1 person

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