Quick Facts
Biography
John Kenneth Bush (born August 24, 1964) is an American attorney and United States Circuit Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. Bush graduated from Harvard Law School and practiced in Washington, D.C. and Louisville, Kentucky, where he served as president of the local branch of the Federalist Society. In 2017, he was nominated to a seat on the Sixth Circuit court by President Donald Trump. During his nomination proceedings, Bush was questioned about pseudonymous blog posts he had written which espoused conservative political views. He was confirmed by the Senate on a party-line vote of 51–47 on July 20, 2017.
Education and career
Bush received his Bachelor of Arts degree, summa cum laude, in 1986 from Vanderbilt University and his Juris Doctor, cum laude, in 1989 from Harvard Law School. He served as a law clerk for Judge J. Smith Henley of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit. He practiced law at the firm of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher in Washington, D.C., before taking a job at Bingham Greenebaum Doll LLP in Louisville, Kentucky. He was a partner at the firm and co-chair of the firm's litigation department. He specialized in complex litigation, including antitrust, securities, financial institutions, insurance, intellectual property, and product liability disputes. He has extensive litigation experience in state and federal courts in many jurisdictions and in arbitration proceedings. He is chair of the Louisville chapter of the Federalist Society.
Federal judicial service
On May 8, 2017, President Donald Trump announced that he would nominate Bush to the seat on the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit vacated by Judge Danny Julian Boggs who took senior status on February 28, 2017. A hearing on his nomination before the United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary was held on June 14, 2017. On a questionnaire submitted to the committee, Bush acknowledged that between 2007 and 2016, he had pseudonymously authored approximately 400 blog posts on Elephants in the Bluegrass, a blog founded by his wife, Bridget. His blog posts espoused conservative political views and expressed opposition to gay marriage, the Affordable Care Act, public financing of political campaigns, and the idea of trying terrorists in civilian courts. Bush also compared abortion to slavery, calling the topics "the two greatest tragedies in our country." When questioned about his blogging during his judicial nomination process, Bush said that "my personal views are irrelevant to the position for which I have been nominated" and that "Blogging is a political activity. It is not appropriate to bring politics to the bench." On July 19, 2017, the Senate voted in favor of cloture by a vote of 51-48. On July 20, 2017, the United States Senate voted 51-47 to confirm him. He received his judicial commission on July 21, 2017.