WASHINGTON (CN) — The Senate voted Tuesday to confirm Sixth Circuit nominee Stephanie Dawkins Davis, making it the second time the Cincinnati-based court has had a Black female judge and the first time the post has gone to a Black woman from Michigan.
Approved by a vote of 49-43, Davis will fill the seat vacated by Judge Helene White, who is taking senior status.
Judge Davis spent the past three years as a federal judge for the Eastern District of Michigan, following her appointment to that bench by President Donald Trump. During the 2019 confirmation process, Davis ascended to the bench with broad bipartisan support and a unanimous voice vote in the Senate.
At the time, Davis was the first Black woman Trump had tapped for the federal bench — the culmination of months of negotiations between Trump and Michigan Senators Debbie Stabenow and Gary Peters, both of whom are Democrats.
"I'm confident that Judge Davis has the professional qualifications, the independence and the fundamental sense of fairness and justice to make her again worthy of the Senate's favorable consideration," Peters said during Davis' confirmation hearing back in March.
Peters said Davis was "a born litigator," inspired to have a career in law after the Supreme Court's ruling in Brown v. Board of Education.
Biden's decision to elevate Davis to serve as federal appeals judge marks a rare moment of continuity between the Trump and Biden administrations.
During his first term in office, Biden has focused heavily on increasing demographic and professional diversity among federal judges, while Trump's presidency saw the nomination of predominantly white men to the federal bench.
Davis' time as a judge in the Eastern District of Michigan was marked by several notable cases, including her 2020 injunction against a Michigan law that banned organizations from transporting voters to the polls.
The Sixth Circuit stayed the injunction in time for Election Day and later reversed Davis' injunction.
Senator Marsha Blackburn, a Tennessee Republican, brought up the case during Davis' March confirmation hearing, calling the now-invalid law "vote hauling" and criticizing Davis' decision.
Davis also previously served as a magistrate judge for the Eastern District of Michigan from 2016 to 2019.
Before she became a judge, Davis worked in civil and criminal law and spent most of her career as a federal prosecutor. She joined the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Michigan after a stint representing corporations in civil litigation for the firm Dickinson Wright in Detroit.
Her time as a prosecutor began in the civil division. She later served as deputy chief of the office's controlled substances unit. In 2010, Davis became an executive assistant U.S. attorney and led the state's re-entry efforts for people leaving incarceration.
Davis earned her associate's and bachelor's degrees from Wichita State University and her law degree from Washington University in St. Louis.
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