As noted by the Maryland Appellate Blog, the Fourth Circuit may be getting a new judge.  According to the White House Press Release, Pamela Harris is “a visiting professor at the Georgetown University Law Center and a senior advisor to its Supreme Court Institute.”

Professor Harris’ Georgetown bio states that she

served as Principal Deputy to the Assistant Attorney General for Office of Legal Policy at the Department of Justice from 2010 to 2012. Prior to that, she was the Executive Director of the Supreme Court Institute at the Georgetown Law Center. Until 2009, Pam was a partner and then of counsel at the law firm of O’Melveny & Myers, where she was a member of the Supreme Court and appellate practice, specializing in public interest litigation. Pam was also a Lecturer at the Harvard Law School, as Co-Director of Harvard’s Supreme Court and Appellate Advocacy Clinic. Before joining O’Melveny, Pam taught at University of Pennsylvania Law School, where she specialized in constitutional criminal procedure and the law of church and state. From 1993 to 1996, Pam worked in the Office of Legal Counsel at the Department of Justice. She served as a law clerk to Justice John Paul Stevens of the United States Supreme Court and Judge Harry T. Edwards of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals.

If confirmed, Professor Harris would fill the seat vacated by Judge Davis when he took senior status in February 2014.  Judge Davis is one of only two senior status judges on the Fourth Circuit–the other senior judge being Judge Clyde Hamilton who took senior status in 1999.

–Beth Scherer