With one exception, Trump-appointed appeals judges are more likely to vote in favor of religious liberty, new study says
In a new study, three law professors looked at voting records in more than 500 federal appellate cases involving the free exercise clause from 2000 to 2022. Image from Shutterstock.
Former President Donald Trump lived up to his promise to appoint judges favoring religious liberty, at least when the plaintiff is a Christian, according to a new study of voting records by circuit judges by three law professors.
The New York Times has a story on the study by Stephen J. Choi, a professor at the New York University School of Law; Mitu Gulati, a professor at the University of Virginia School of Law; and Eric A. Posner, a professor at the University of Chicago Law School.
The professors looked at voting records in more than 500 federal appellate cases involving the free exercise clause from 2000 to 2022. Trump-appointed circuit judges cast a pro-religion vote 45.4% of the time, compared to 36.1% for other GOP-appointed judges and 33.3% for Democratic appointees.
When the professors narrowed the cases to those involving Christianity only, Trump appointees voted in favor of religion in 56.5% of the free exercise cases, compared to 42.4% for judges appointed by other Republicans and 29.3% for judges appointed by Democrats.
But in cases involving Islam, Trump-appointed judges voted in favor of Muslim plaintiffs in only 19.2% of the cases, compared to 34.5% for judges appointed by other Republicans and 48% for judges appointed by Democrats.
The professors also examined several characteristics of 807 district and circuit judges appointed by Trump and six other former presidents. The researchers looked at judges who were active as of December 2020, and to include more judges appointed by Trump and former President Barack Obama, they included judges on senior status appointed by those two presidents.
The researchers found:
- Among judges whose religious affiliation was known to the researchers, 97.8% of Trump-appointed judges are Christian, compared to 91% of judges appointed by other Republican presidents and 87% of Democratic appointees.
- 71.8% of Trump-appointed judges received a top ABA rating of well qualified, compared to 60.4% for other Republican appointees and 62.8% for Democratic appointees.
- 27.8% of Trump-appointed judges attended law schools ranked in the top 10 by U.S. News & World Report in 1987, the first year of its rankings. The percentage was 23.9% for judges appointed by other Republicans and 35.5% for Democratic appointees.
- 56% of Trump-appointed judges belonged to the Federalist Society, a conservative group, compared to 22.3% of judges appointed by other Republicans and 2% of Democratic appointees. When narrowed to only federal appeals judges, 88.5% of Trump appointees were in the Federalist Society, compared to 44.2% for other Republican-appointed circuit judges.
- 9.3% of Trump-appointed judges were members of the National Rifle Association, compared to 1.6% of judges appointed by other Republicans and 0.7% of Democratic appointees.
