71 Georgetown alumni serve as federal judges; Trump appointed 19 of them, records show

By Helena Thorncroft

WASHINGTON — Seventy-one people who hold a Georgetown University degree are serving as federal judges, according to an Inquisitor analysis of the Federal Judicial Center’s Biographical Directory of Article III Federal Judges. Nineteen of them were last appointed by President Donald Trump, more than by any other president, and five of those 19 were commissioned in his second term.

The count puts Georgetown in a tie with the University of Virginia for third place among the schools The Inquisitor checked, behind Harvard and Yale. The results come as the White House works to confirm judges before the Nov. 3 midterm elections. White House spokeswoman Lauren Bis said in September that “President Trump selects highly qualified and credentialed judicial nominees who have passed the White House’s rigorous vetting process,” according to Reuters, and that he “will select highly qualified nominees with great respect for our Constitution and rule of law to be confirmed expeditiously.”

Senate Democrats have said Trump’s second-term nominees reflect an emphasis on loyalty, Reuters reported. They pointed to hearing answers in which nominees avoided saying directly that Trump lost the 2020 election.

Trump has appointed 55 judges to the district courts, appeals courts and Supreme Court since returning to office, through Oct. 15, according to a Pew Research Center analysis of the same FJC data. Pew found that is fewer than he had at the same point in his first term (83) and fewer than President Joe Biden had (81).

This is an Inquisitor Data report. It is labeled Premium, but The Inquisitor does not yet have a paid tier, so the full story is free to read.

How The Inquisitor counted

The Federal Judicial Center is the research and education agency of the federal courts. Its export file lists every judge who has served on the Supreme Court, the courts of appeals, the district courts and the U.S. Court of International Trade, along with each judge’s schools and degrees. The Inquisitor downloaded the file on Oct. 27, 2026. Its most recent commission date is Oct. 22, 2026.

The Inquisitor counted a judge as a Georgetown alumnus if any listed degree came from Georgetown University or one of its schools, including the Law Center, the School of Foreign Service and the College. Judges were counted as serving if the directory listed no termination of their most recent appointment. That includes judges on senior status, who hear reduced caseloads. The appointing president and court are those of each judge’s most recent appointment. Georgetown University has no role in the selection of judges, and this analysis does not suggest otherwise.

By that measure, 149 Georgetown alumni have served on the federal bench since the 19th century. Of the 71 now serving, 48 are active and 23 are on senior status. Fifty-two hold a Georgetown law degree, and 19 hold only a Georgetown undergraduate or graduate degree outside law. Twenty-four are women and 47 are men.

Georgetown judges by appointing president

Judges appointed by Republican presidents make up 38 of the 71, and Democratic appointees make up 33. Among active judges, the split is 25 Republican appointees to 23 Democratic appointees. Among senior judges, it is 13 to 10.

Of Trump’s 19 Georgetown-educated judges, 14 were commissioned in his first term and five in his second. Every Trump and Biden appointee on the list is still active. Most of the Clinton and George W. Bush appointees have taken senior status.

A dash means the directory records no roll-call tally, as with nominees confirmed by voice vote. Bianco was first appointed a district judge by President George W. Bush, and Trump elevated him to the Second Circuit in 2019, according to his FJC biography. Half of the 14 first-term judges studied at Georgetown Law. The other half hold Georgetown undergraduate or graduate degrees. The longest-serving judge on the list is Judge Eugene E. Siler Jr. of the Sixth Circuit, who earned a Georgetown LL.M. in 1964 and was first commissioned to the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky in 1975, according to the directory.

Where they sit

No current Supreme Court justice holds a Georgetown degree, according to the directory.

Four Georgetown alumni sit on the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, which hears many of the cases involving the federal government. They are Senior Judge Thomas F. Hogan (A.B. 1960, J.D. 1966), a Reagan appointee; Judge Amit P. Mehta (B.A. 1993), an Obama appointee; Judge Timothy J. Kelly (J.D. 1997), a Trump appointee confirmed 94-2; and Judge Loren L. AliKhan (J.D. 2006), a Biden appointee confirmed 51-50, according to FJC records.

The appeals courts

Seventeen Georgetown alumni sit on federal appeals courts, including the Federal Circuit, which hears patent cases. They include Chief Judge Kimberly A. Moore of the Federal Circuit, Judge Thomas M. Hardiman of the Third Circuit and Judge Jerome A. Holmes of the Tenth Circuit.

The table shows how Senate votes have tightened. The three Bush-era active judges on the list were confirmed with no more than 30 votes against, and two were confirmed without opposition. Of the seven appellate judges commissioned since 2019, five drew 40 or more no votes. The exceptions were Nardini, confirmed 86-2, and Judge Richard E. N. Federico of the Tenth Circuit, confirmed 61-29.

Trump’s second-term Georgetown appointees

Five of the 56 judges commissioned by Trump since Jan. 20, 2025, hold Georgetown degrees, according to the directory. Among the schools The Inquisitor checked, that ties Yale for the most. Harvard had four.

FJC biographies are available for Bluestone, Bove, Artau, Jones and Martin.

Bove, a Georgetown Law graduate, was one of three of Trump’s second-term appellate nominees who had served as his personal attorneys, Reuters reported. His 50-49 confirmation was the closest vote among the five. Martin’s 62-36 vote was the only one of the five with more than 50 votes in favor.

Biden’s Georgetown appointees

Biden appointed 14 of the Georgetown alumni now serving, all still active, according to the FJC directory. Nine of the 14 are women. They include Judge Lydia K. Griggsby of the District of Maryland (J.D. 1993), Judge Angel Kelley of the District of Massachusetts (J.D. 1992), Judge Kymberly K. Evanson of the Western District of Washington (J.D. 2007) and Judge Eumi K. Lee of the Northern District of California (J.D. 1999).

Two of Biden’s Georgetown appointees sit on the Court of International Trade, which hears tariff and customs cases. Judge Lisa W. Wang (J.D. 2006) was confirmed 53-42. Judge Joseph A. Laroski Jr., who holds a Georgetown foreign service degree and a Georgetown Law LL.M., was confirmed 76-0, the only unanimous vote among the Biden appointees on the list, according to the directory. Senior Judge Timothy C. Stanceu (J.D. 1979), a George W. Bush appointee, is the third Georgetown alumnus on that court.

Biden’s Georgetown appointees were confirmed by narrow margins. Twelve of the 14 drew at least 39 no votes. AliKhan was confirmed 51-50 and Lee 50-49.

Women on the list

Women make up 24 of the 71 serving Georgetown-educated judges, about a third. The share differs by appointing president: nine of Biden’s 14, six of Obama’s 10, four of George W. Bush’s 15, three of Trump’s 19 and two of Clinton’s nine, according to an Inquisitor tally of the FJC records. None of the four Reagan and George H.W. Bush appointees still serving are women.

How Georgetown compares

The Inquisitor ran the same count for 12 other law schools that place large numbers of graduates on the bench. Schools were matched by name in the FJC degree fields, so a judge with degrees from two schools counts once for each.

The directory lists 1,464 serving judges, 845 of them active. Georgetown alumni make up about 4.8% of all serving judges and about 5.7% of active judges.

By law degree alone, Georgetown ranks fourth, behind Harvard, Yale and Virginia. Its total depends heavily on undergraduates and graduate students. Nineteen serving judges hold Georgetown degrees outside law, including Mehta, Bianco, Nardini and Merriam, and Judge Kevin G. Ritz of the Sixth Circuit, who holds a master’s degree from the School of Foreign Service.

What the data does not show

The FJC directory records education, appointments and Senate votes. It does not record how judges rule. The Inquisitor did not attempt to measure outcomes by school, and nothing in the data shows any connection between where judges studied and how they decide cases.

The pace of new appointments depends on vacancies. Pew noted that only three appeals judges stepped down or announced plans to do so between the 2024 election and the end of Trump’s first year back in office. Three of Trump’s judicial nominees were awaiting full Senate votes, and 13 were awaiting Judiciary Committee votes, as of Pew’s Oct. 21 report. Any Georgetown alumni among them would join the list if confirmed.

The Inquisitor is seeking comment from the White House Counsel’s Office, the Senate Judiciary Committee’s Republican and Democratic staffs, and Georgetown University Law Center on these findings. This story will be updated with any responses.

Photo: Georgetown University Law Center, McDonough Hall (cropped). Tony Webster, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.