Tiffany Johnson – Nominee to the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia

Seeking to solidify his mark on the federal bench as his time as President winds down, President Biden has nominated federal prosecutor Tiffany Johnson to replace Judge Steve Jones on the Northern District of Georgia.

Background

Born in 1986, Tiffany Johnson got a B.A. magna cum laude from Princeton University in 2009 and then attended Wake Forest University Law School, graduating in 2012. Following her graduation, Johnson joined Parker, Hudson, Rainer & Dobbs LLP in Atlanta as a litigation associate. Since 2017, Johnson has worked as an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Georgia, starting in the Civil Division and then working in the Criminal Division.

History of the Seat

Johnson has been nominated for a seat on the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia. This seat will open on January 1, 2025, when Judge Steve Jones moves to senior status.

Legal Experience

Johnson started her legal career at the Atlanta office of Parker, Hudson, Rainer & Dobbs LLP. At the firm, Johnson represented the Plumbers and Steamfitters Local No. 150 Pension Fund in an ERISA dispute relating to contributions into the system. See Plumbers and Steamfitters Local No. 150 Pension Fund v. Muns Group, Inc., No. 1:15-cv-200 (S.D. Ga. Aug. 26, 2016).

From 2017 to 2020, Johnson served as an Assistant U.S. Attorney with the Civil Division of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Georgia. In this role, Johnson acted to defend the United States in civil suits filed, for example, in suits challenging immigration decisions made by the Department of Homeland Security. See, e.g., CARE v. Nielsen, 461 F. Supp. 3d 1289 (N.D. Ga. 2020).

Since 2020, Johnson has worked as a federal prosecutor with the Criminal Division of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Georgia. Among the matters she handled there, Johnson prosecuted Atlanta CFO Jim Beard for improperly using city money to pay his personal expenses. See City of Atlanta’s Former Chief Financial Officer Pleads Guilty to Federal Program Theft and Tax Obstruction, AllonGeorgia, Apr. 8, 2024, https://allongeorgia.com/georgia-public-safety/city-of-atlantas-former-chief-financial-officer-pleads-guilty-to-federal-program-theft-and-tax-obstruction/.

Overall Assessment

At 37, Johnson is one of the youngest nominees put forward for the federal bench by Biden. However, provided that Democrats can remain united on her nomination, Johnson should nonetheless be able to confirmed before the end of this Congress.

46 Comments

  1. Dequan's avatar

    This is one of the nominees I havent been able to find much out about. I will trust Ossoff & Warnock vetted her thoroughly & she will turn out closer to the other three Georgia judges we haven’t gotten from Biden, all three who are phenomenal. Johnson will be one of the three youngest Biden judges. I looked up pictures of her & with such a common name, many different pics came up. I believe the correct picture was a Black woman with braids.

    Like

  2. Frank's avatar

    Besides the age, this seems like a pretty traditional nominee in line with previous Democratic administrations. Agree with Harsh that her ability to be confirmed by the end of the year will be based on if she can keep the Democratic caucus united.

    Liked by 1 person

  4. keystone's avatar

    Can confirm that research is a lil tricky bc she has a very common name… so be careful of what you find.

    I’ve seen a few references to her being a “labor and employment attorney”, which would fit with the Steamfitters Union case referenced in the write up.

    I found some bio stuff about her from her days at Princeton. She’s a self described “army brat” (which Im sure will be played up in the judiciary intro). Before becoming. lawyer, she was very active in theater and dance and, while at Princeton, was artistic director of the university’s BodyHype dance company.

    https://www.princeton.edu/~bodyhype/company/tiffany.html

    I’m waiting for them to pull up video of some “woke” or “marxist” dance performance and for Kennedy to pronounce “bodyhype dance company” is a really creepy and gross way.

    IMO, Kennedy has been kinda shitty towards candidates who are black women (Dana Douglas aside). Given Johnson’s age and her demographics, I would not be surprised if Professor Kennedy really grills her. If I were Ms. Johnson, I’d def brush up on the legal textbooks.

    On the positive side, Ossoff will be there to shutdown any foolishness thrown at Johnson, similar to what Klobochar did with Provinzino.

    Also, with the GA polls tightening, I’m not sure that the GOP really wants a bunch of videos of Kennedy, with his thick drawl, or Hawley, with his Hitler Youth fashion sense, berating a young black woman to surface in the ATL media market this close to the election. So maybe they will be behaved.

    Liked by 1 person

  5. Gavi's avatar

    It’s difficult for me to think of anyone who’s older than I am as “youngest” anything, but I get that everything is relative. I really hope Johnson is a progressive or more liberal than the average Biden district court picks. She’ll have such a great future on the courts.

    @Rick, I just saw your comment on the previous post.

    THREE?! That’s crazy!
    Say what you will about Wisconsin’s current supreme court, but I think it has one of the best judicial election schedules, where only one justice at a time can be on the ballot. There’s always pros and cons, but spending to keep or take 3 seats at once is not insignificant. Back in the day it probably wasn’t a big deal. But elections, especially ones to high stake offices, have become a bareknuckle partisan brawl, and no longer the sleepy affairs they were.
    Don’t sleep on elections in 2025. Besides those 3 PA seats, liberals in Wisconsin need to win an open supreme court seat to keep their hard-fought, recently gained, bare majority on that court. Also, NJ and VA will be replacing their governors. Maybe “off-year” isn’t what it used to be.
    Also, much depends on who wins the WH in November. If you think those races (or the mid-terms in 2026) will be easy wins for Dems with Harris in the WH, I’d like to remind you that there has always been major electoral backlash to “progress” in this country. The election of the first woman may face a Tea Party style wipeout that followed Obama’s election in 2008 and continued to decimate elected Dems throughout his presidency.

    Liked by 2 people

  6. Ethan's avatar

    Despite me being from Georgia, she was not on my radar at all. I believe she is only the second line AUSA (as in they don’t hold any leadership position) to be nominated to the bench by Biden, with the other being Robert White in EDMI.

    Liked by 1 person

  10. star0garnet's avatar

    While I’m hoping for nominations this afternoon, it’s irrelevant to our ability to hold two hearings in September, as the hearing on the 11th could just have the three nominees from July 31. Biden has two weeks to fill the slot on September 25.

    Liked by 1 person

  11. Joe's avatar

    To be honest, the July 31 batch was very surprising. I almost wonder if someone messed up the dates and sent it out two weeks early. Unless they are holding a hearing during the recess (unlikely) then it could’ve waited until today.

    Nominees from an August 28 batch could still receive a hearing in September, so it may even out.

    Liked by 1 person

  12. tsb1991's avatar

    As long as we get nominees by 8/28, we can hold two hearings in September (9/11 and 9/25), today was for whether or not we could get additional nominees into the 9/11 hearing.

    If you’re like me and like to check who did the pro forma sessions, we’re now at 4 down, 7 to go. I guess I’ll never see an era where both the House and Senate could agree on adjournment schedules and even do sine die adjournments in December (I think they just run pro forma sessions up until the third and then the last pro forma is the sine die adjournment)?

    Liked by 1 person

    • Gavi's avatar

      Like you said, this might be a you thing. I personally don’t see anything exciting about who gavels in and out of a 10-second session.

      But to go to the only part of this niche that remotely has anything to do with judges, the House and Senate have different interests in pro forma sessions and don’t ever need to “agree” on that schedule, which would require a *concurrent* resolution (the Senate’s interest would be to prevent recess appointments). Both chambers, however, would need to adopt, and the president to sign, a joint resolution to set the opening day of a new congress if it’s any date other than January 3. Otherwise, each House does its own thing.

      Liked by 1 person

  14. Zack's avatar

    Unless they do a surprise nomination announcement before the end of the day/tomorrow, the July 31st nominees are the only ones that will be at the first September hearing.
    I fully expect Anthony Brindisi to get the full brunt of the attacks, not just from his time in Congress but the lawsuit he filed over voting problems over his eventual loss in 2020 to Claudia Tenney.
    All I’ll say is both the Democratic and Republican county clerk ended up resigning over issues related to it so while his complaints were valid, it will likely be pushed by the Republicans as “proof” there were issues elsewhere and that Trump won.
    He will be a party line vote.
    As for Tiffany Johnson, I don’t expect any issues with her but time.

    Liked by 1 person

    • tsb1991's avatar

      Just beat me to this, I know some people have asked about giving Andy Kim a headstart by appointing him now, but that’d likely leave his House seat open for the rest of Congress.

      All we need from this guy is to just stick his thumb (or index finger) up to the clerk on party-line judges and he’ll be satisfactory, right?

      Liked by 1 person

    • Dequan's avatar

      While I was hoping for Jeh Johnson if not Andy Kim, my main concern was getting Kim seniority over the other new senators that start in January. It seems from the article that they have solved that problem if George Helmy has agreed to resign upon the certification of Kim. So a win/win.

      Congrats on the free parking spot for life in the senate parking garage. With the price for parking in the DC area, that probably is worth more that the senate salary he will receive with him being 44 years old. Not a bad gig for four months of work.

      Liked by 1 person

  17. Dequan's avatar

    I just happened to take a look at the People’s Parity Project list of recommendations for federal judges & they have seemed to have added some names for the first-time since they initially put their list out. So far, the Biden administration has picked two people from their list. One for a judgeship (Natasha Merle) & one non judge (Karla Gilbride). Another has also become a state supreme court justice since they first put out the list (Allison Riggs). Here are the added names with a link for each…

    (https://peoplesparity.org/unrigthecourts/#list)

    1. Sanjukta Paul (https://michigan.law.umich.edu/faculty-and-scholarship/our-faculty/sanjukta-paul)
    2. Jackie Prange (https://www.linkedin.com/in/jackie-prange-5a574038)
    3. Jessica Ramey Stender (https://www.equalrights.org/about/bios/jessica-stender/)
    4. Stephanie Toti (https://lawyeringproject.org/staff-member/stephanie-toti/)

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  18. Dequan's avatar

    It looks like I got Word Pressed. My comment is saying “Your comment is awaiting moderation.“. I’ll post what I wrote without the links & see if that works…

    I just happened to take a look at the People’s Parity Project list of recommendations for federal judges & they have seemed to have added some names for the first-time since they initially put their list out. So far, the Biden administration has picked two people from their list. One for a judgeship (Natasha Merle) & one non judge (Karla Gilbride). Another has also become a state supreme court justice since they first put out the list (Allison Riggs). Here are the added names…

    1. Sanjukta Paul
    2. Jackie Prange
    3. Jessica Ramey Stender
    4. Stephanie Toti

    Like

  19. tsb1991's avatar

    The article about the Menendez replacement also suggests he’ll be sworn in on Monday, the 9th when the Senate gets back. The only vote happening that day is the Abelson cloture vote, but Harris should be in town as she’ll need to swear Helmy into the Senate (unless Patty Murray as President pro tempore has that power). There was a chance that if he’s sworn in on the Tuesday, when they’d vote on Vargas, that Harris could be around to break any ties on Vargas if needed, but she’ll probably rocket out of DC after Helmy is sworn in to get back on the trail.

    If you assume full attendance and Vance being out all month, you’d have 50-49 party-line votes (with Manchin voting no, of course), and like I said, if you know you’ll have full attendance get the party-line nominees out now and save the easier nominees for the lame duck.

    Liked by 1 person

    • keystone's avatar

      I’m still a bit worried about Sinema. Did we ever find out what was up with her no vote on Maldonado? The only votes since then have been for a handful of noms who had bipartisan support. Not sure if that vote was a fluke or an adoption of Manchin-esque ideology. It will be interesting to see how Sinema votes on Vargas.

      Liked by 2 people

      • Dequan's avatar

        In 5 days we will officially get rid of the worst Democrat senator. I look forward to January when we get rid of the next two on the list. I was honestly ok with Manchin until he abdicated his duty as a senator to how all Republicans voted. That’s just dumb. I understand pushing for bipartisan picks but to not individually base his vote on the actual nominee was the last straw for me with him. And of course I use to say I could deal with Sinema’s antics because she was 100% on judges. I thought Kato Crews might have been a one off but now she seems to be matching her antics with no votes.

        Liked by 1 person

  20. Joe's avatar

    It’s hard to say on Sinema until we see more of a pattern. Perhaps her no on Maldonado was because of the (unfounded in my opinion) attacks on her case backlog.

    Unfortunately she never really comments on her votes in the senate, so we’ll likely never know her criteria, if a pattern does emerge.

    Liked by 1 person

  21. Joe's avatar

    With no new nominees yesterday, I look forward to the next batch on or around August 28. I really hope we get picks for 3rd circuit, SD CA, CD CA, ND NY, and D Arizona. That would cover every current opening that’s not subject to blue slips.

    There is also the New Mexico vacancy as well as possible replacements for Netburn and Kanter. Maybe we could see some or all of those in a potential October batch and try to sneak them in during the lame duck period.

    Liked by 2 people

  22. Dequan's avatar

    I hope Vance post his schedule for all 3 weeks the senate will be in session in September early. Hopefully he will just not return at all. Then we have to hope Schumer tees up Ritz, Lipez, Kidd & Campbell. Park would be icing on the cake the end of the third week but I assume they will infringe lame duck for him.

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    • keystone's avatar

      I feel like if Lipez didn’t have Collins’ support, we would have heard about it by now. Surely, if that was the case, Blackburn or Tillis or McConnell would have mentioned, “and they even refused to work w Sen Collins who’s known for her bipartisanship….” in one of their numerous rants.

      I think Lipez is gonna leapfrog her way up the list.

      Liked by 2 people

      • Dequan's avatar

        That’s what bothers me about how Schumer schedules the votes. If he knows Vance is going to be out, plus we have Helmy in New Jersey, what better time to bring up the tougher nominees first. I would hold off on Lipez until you have an attendance issue. But Schumer always rushes to confirm the easy nominees first regardless of attendance so after they all run out, we are stuck confirming the Secretary of Baking Cookies & other meaningless positions for a week or two.

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  24. tsb1991's avatar

    If we do get multiple appeals court nominees confirmed in September, it might look a bit like September 2022, where there was a tradeoff in the voting schedule. Appeals court nominees have the 30 hours of postcloture time but in September 2022 there was an agreement to “expedite” the nominees by not needing to use all 30 hours, but the tradeoff was a lighter voting schedule for most of the September session. Looking back at the Senate Cloakroom Twitter feed:

    9/6: Cloture invoked on John Lee (5:30PM Tuesday vote, the day after Labor Day)
    9/7: John Lee confirmed, cloture invoked on Andre Mathis (both votes held at 2:15PM on Wednesday, around 18-20 postcloture hours for Lee)
    9/8: Mathis confirmed at 11:30AM, Cloture vote for Mendoza at 1:45PM (so around 18-20 postcloture hours on Mathis)
    9/12: Mendoza confirmed at 5:30PM, cloture invoked on Freeman
    9/13: Freeman not confirmed due to attendance issues at 11:30AM, cloture invoked on Montecalvo
    9/14: Montecalvo confirmed at 11:30AM, cloture invoked on Merriam (24 hours of postcloture for Montecalvo)
    9/15: Merriam confirmed at 11:30AM (24 hours of postcloture roughly), 1:45PM vote on non-judicial nominee
    9/19: Cloture invoked on Pan at 5:30PM
    9/20: Pan confirmed on 11:30AM vote (18-20 postcloture hours)

    After that Freeman wasn’t confirmed until the end of the September session, but you can see during that streak of appeals court nominees only two votes were being held per day.

    One advantage to 2022 is that there isn’t an enormous backlog of appeals court judges like in 2022. After the August break in 2022, 7 appeals court judges were confirmed in September, 3 were confirmed in December during the lame duck, and then an additional 8 were confirmed in the next Congress, for a total of 18 appeals court nominees waiting confirmation from the August recess. That number would be 7 at the absolute most this year (and that’s including Mangi and a nomination for the Delaware 3rd Circuit seat).

    Liked by 1 person

    • Dequan's avatar

      I’m not sure if the schedule can get any lighter than 3 weeks in session between the entire month of August through the week after the election in November. But if they agree to confirm all of the circuit court nominees pending save Mangi & Park before the recess it would be worth giving them another couple days off. All of the remaining district court nominees can be confirmed in the lame duck.

      Liked by 1 person

  26. Jamie's avatar

    I would bring up Park and Campbell in September. Both of them represent groups that Democrats need to energize (labor and Asians). Even if rank and file voters don’t know about judges, leaders who get out the vote do. The UAW leadership cares big time about Campbell as the 6th Circuit includes MI and OH.

    Liked by 1 person

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