Washington ― The Senate Judiciary Committee voted 13-8 Thursday morning to nominate Michigan U.S. Magistrate Judge Jonathan J.C. Gray to the Eastern District Court of Michigan.
Gray received bipartisan support, including Republican Sens. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Chuck Grassley of Iowa, among other Democrats on the panel. No senator spoke against his nomination at Thursday’s hearing.
Gray, 40, of Detroit, had a hearing before the panel last year, but the Senate ran out of time to review his nomination before the end of the year, forcing President Joe Biden to renominate him last month.
Gray was sworn in on August 24, 2021 and has served as a magistrate judge for about 17 months.
Previously, Gray was an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Ohio from 2016 and from 2012 to 2016 for the Eastern District of Michigan, handling illegal firearms, fraud and international narcotics cases. She also led diversity programs and anti-domestic violence initiatives.
Born in Mississippi and raised in Baton Rouge, Gray is a graduate of Morehouse College and Georgetown University Law Center. He is an executive board member of the Urban League of Detroit and Southeast Michigan and a mentor for the Simba Mentoring Program for Franklin County Children.
“I was shaped by the experiences I had growing up in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, in different communities of different means. I was shaped by different access to education,” Gray told senators at his November hearing.
“I have been shaped by meeting people from different cultures and the experiences I carry with me as a federal circuit judge to keep an open mind, to not prejudge any case before me, and to decide each case fairly and impartially.”
Prior to his time as an attorney, Gray was in private practice as a partner at Seyfat Shaw LLP in Chicago, practicing labor and employment law.
Gray also served as a clerk for the well-known Judge Damon J. Keith clerked for the US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. He is also the secretary of the judge of the judge V. Louis Sands was on the United States District Court for the Middle District. Georgia.
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