Thomas B. Griffith

Thomas B. Griffith was a federal judge on the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. He was appointed by President George W. Bush in June 2005 and was confirmed by a vote of 73–24. He served for fifteen years before retiring. On April 9, 2021, US president Joe Biden named Griffith to the new Presidential Commission on the Supreme Court of the United States. "The White House said Biden’s executive order created the commission to analyze proposals for Supreme Court reform, including whether to increase the court’s size, change how long justices serve and reconsider how justices are selected."[1]

Griffith was born on July 5, 1954, in Yokohama, Japan, where his father was stationed with the US Army. He grew up in Virginia and served as student body president at his high school in McLean, Virginia. For two summers during high school, he worked in the office of Congressman Mo Udall, who was a neighbor.

Griffith was baptized a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints during his junior year. After high school he served as a full-time missionary in South Africa. In 1978, he earned his bachelor’s degree in humanities from Brigham Young University. He then earned his law degree from the University of Virginia School of Law.

Griffith practiced law from 1985 to 1995 and again in 1999, first in Charlotte, North Carolina, where he was an associate at Robinson, Bradshaw & Hinson, and later in Washington, DC, where he was an associate and then a partner at Wiley, Rein & Fielding. His areas of emphasis included commercial and corporate litigation and government investigations. From 1995 to 1999, Griffith was Senate Legal Counsel of the United States, the chief legal officer of the United States Senate. In that capacity, he represented the interests of the Senate in litigation and advised the Senate leadership and its committees on investigations, including the impeachment trial of President Bill Clinton. From 2000 until his appointment to the US Court of Appeals, Griffith served as assistant to the president and general counsel of BYU. From 1999 to 2000, he was general counsel to the Advisory Commission on Electronic Commerce, a congressional commission created to study the interplay between tax policy and electronic commerce. During 2002–2003, he served as a member of the United States Secretary of Education’s Commission on Opportunity in Athletics, which examined the role of Title IX in intercollegiate athletics.

Griffith and his wife, Susan, are the parents of six children.