Brett M. Kavanaugh

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US Supreme Court justice since 2018

Brett Michael Kavanaugh (/ˈkævənɔː/ ; born February 12, 1965) is an American lawyer and jurist serving as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States . He was nominated by President Donald Trump on July 9, 2018, and has served since October 6, 2018. He was previously a United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit from 2006 to 2018.

Kavanaugh studied history at Yale University , where he joined the Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity. After graduating from Yale Law School , he served as a law clerk for Judge Ken Starr of the D.C. Circuit . After Starr left the D.C. Circuit to become the head of the Office of Independent Counsel, Kavanaugh assisted him with investigations concerning President Bill Clinton , including drafting the _Starr Report _ recommending Clinton's impeachment . He joined the Bush administration as White House staff secretary and was a central figure in its efforts to identify and confirm judicial nominees. Bush nominated Kavanaugh to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in 2003. His confirmation hearings were contentious and stalled for three years over charges of partisanship. Kavanaugh was confirmed to the District of Columbia Circuit in May 2006.

President Trump nominated Kavanaugh to the United States Supreme Court on July 9, 2018, to fill the position vacated by Justice Anthony Kennedy . Before his United States Senate confirmation proceedings began, Christine Blasey Ford accused Kavanaugh of sexually assaulting her in the early 1980s.

Three other women also accused Kavanaugh of sexual misconduct.

None of the accusations were corroborated by eyewitness testimony, and Kavanaugh denied them. The Senate Judiciary Committee held a supplemental hearing over the allegations and voted 11–10 along party lines to advance the confirmation to a full Senate vote. On October 6, the full Senate confirmed Kavanaugh by a vote of 50–48.

Since the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg in 2020, Kavanaugh has come to be regarded as a swing vote on the Court.

He was the target of an assassination plot in June 2022; the suspect had hoped to disrupt the rulings in _Dobbs _ and _Bruen _.

Early life and education

Kavanaugh was born on February 12, 1965, in Washington, D.C. , the son of Martha Gamble (née Murphy) and Everett Edward Kavanaugh Jr.

He is of Irish Catholic descent on both sides of his family. His paternal great-grandfather Patrick Kavanaugh immigrated to Connecticut from Roscommon, Ireland , in 1878,

and his maternal great-great-grandfather Michael Murphy and his wife emigrated from Ireland to New Jersey.

Kavanaugh's father was a lawyer and served as the president of the Cosmetic, Toiletry and Fragrance Association for two decades. His mother was a history teacher at Woodson and McKinley high schools in Washington in the 1960s and 1970s. She earned a Juris Doctor degree from American University in 1978 and served from 1995 to 2001 as a Maryland Circuit Court judge in Montgomery County, Maryland .

Kavanaugh was raised in Bethesda, Maryland . As a teenager, he attended Georgetown Preparatory School , a Jesuit boys' college prep school, where he was two years ahead of Neil Gorsuch , with whom he later clerked at the Supreme Court and alongside whom he later served as a Supreme Court justice.

He was captain of the school's basketball team and was a wide receiver and cornerback on the football team. Kavanaugh was also friends with classmate Mark Judge ; both were in the same class with Maryland state senator [Rich

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On the 14 occasions on which Kavanaugh authored opinions that were considered by the Supreme Court, the Court adopted his position 13 times and reversed his position once. These included cases involving environmental regulations , criminal procedure , the separation of powers and extraterritorial jurisdiction in human rights abuse cases.

He was regarded as a feeder judge . …