Does anyone have any insight on applying to clerk for a newly confirmed judge? Forum
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morrissey
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Does anyone have any insight on applying to clerk for a newly confirmed judge?
There will likely be a handful of federal judges confirmed in the next month or so. Assuming some connection to the respective judge's area, does anyone have experience applying or signaling interest in applying to clerk for the judge prior to any formal position being posted?
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Anonymous User
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Re: Does anyone have any insight on applying to clerk for a newly confirmed judge?
The best way to do this is if you happen to have a mutual tie, like a professor or someone at your law firm (if in practice) make the introduction. I never had any luck cold-emailing newly confirmed appointees, although I did receive a few polite responses that they'd consider my application. (I did eventually land a COA clerkship through traditional means.) You don't have much to lose, but it's a relative long shot for sure.morrissey wrote: ↑Thu Dec 17, 2020 2:30 pmThere will likely be a handful of federal judges confirmed in the next month or so. Assuming some connection to the respective judge's area, does anyone have experience applying or signaling interest in applying to clerk for the judge prior to any formal position being posted?
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Anonymous User
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Re: Does anyone have any insight on applying to clerk for a newly confirmed judge?
I did this successfully. There has been a decent amount of discussion of these issues on the Judicial Clerkships forum, where this post should probably be.
TLDR: see if you can apply via a connection, and do that if you can, as many or most early clerks are hired via connections, otherwise send in a paper app (to their chambers once they have one or to their prior employer). I got mine via a connection, another judge who had already hired me to clerk.
Also, for what it's worth, there's only one judge left to be confirmed, Arias-Marxuach on the First Circuit. All of the district court nominees left have blue slip problems and it doesn't look like Trump will have time to fill Joel Flaum's seat. There have been continuing updates on this on the 2021 thread.
TLDR: see if you can apply via a connection, and do that if you can, as many or most early clerks are hired via connections, otherwise send in a paper app (to their chambers once they have one or to their prior employer). I got mine via a connection, another judge who had already hired me to clerk.
Also, for what it's worth, there's only one judge left to be confirmed, Arias-Marxuach on the First Circuit. All of the district court nominees left have blue slip problems and it doesn't look like Trump will have time to fill Joel Flaum's seat. There have been continuing updates on this on the 2021 thread.
