U.S. Circuit Judge Pauline Newman (YouTube).
The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday shot down a request from the nation”s oldest sitting federal judge, 98-year-old Pauline Newman, to take up her suspension case after she was shelved in 2024 amid complaints about her mental health.
Newman — who was suspended for another year in August 2025 after refusing to undergo “neuropsychological testing” — had asked for a review of her case after she was rejected by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit and a Federal Circuit panel. She alleges that her due process rights have been violated and that her suspension was unconstitutional and “not in accordance with the law,” according to court filings.
“This petition presents questions concerning crucial constitutional and statutory aspects of lifetime tenure and judicial independence, especially the availability of judicial review for intra-branch infringements on judicial service,” Newman’s petition to the Supreme Court said. “Chief Judge Moore has invoked the Disability Act improperly to perpetually sideline Judge Newman until she gives in to the bullying and retires or takes senior status, doing far more than suspending her from new case assignments.”
As previously reported by Law&Crime, Newman was temporarily suspended after complaints about her demeanor and actions at work sparked an investigation. Her judicial colleagues reported concerning behaviors, including unexplained delays and habitual confusion, which led the Federal Circuit to launch its probe into the judge’s mental health.
Newman, who was appointed in 1984 by President Ronald Reagan, allegedly refused to cooperate and failed to provide medical records during the circuit’s investigation.
The New Civil Liberties Alliance (NCLA), which is representing Newman in a lawsuit filed in 2024 challenging her suspension, has described her removal as a threat to “judicial independence and the Constitutional separation of powers.” A Federal Circuit panel previously dismissed Newman and the NCLA’s complaint against her suspension on jurisdictional grounds, based on its interpretation of the Judicial Council’s 2001 ruling in McBryde v. Committee to Review Circuit Council Conduct & Disability Orders of the U.S. Judicial Conference.
The NCLA argued the panel “opined that McBryde was probably wrongly decided and all but invited a petition for rehearing en banc,” according to a press release.
“As the panel realized, the McBryde court wrongly found that the Disability Act prevents any courts from hearing constitutional arguments challenging Judicial Council suspension orders and other disciplinary actions against judges,” the NCLA release explained. “The panel wrote that the 2001 decision ‘misapplied’ the Disability Act to deny court’s jurisdiction over cases like this one, ‘relied on a potentially strained reading of the relevant legislative history,’ and ‘raise[d] constitutional concerns’ in itself.”
In its petition to the Supreme Court, the NCLA accused the Federal Circuit of trying to silence Newman as she was known as a “judge who is famous for dissenting from her colleagues” — also known as the “Great Dissenter,” per the court filing.
“This administrative removal of a judge who is famous for dissenting from her colleagues, by those same colleagues, with judicial refusal to review the merits of the action, undermines the judicial independence that is a vital foundation of our constitutional design,” Newman’s lawyers wrote. “Every judge who gets crosswise with her chief judge or her colleagues must now worry whether similar tactics could be used to remove them.”
Newman and the NCLA pointed out how “Newman has continued to speak and write before the legal community, and no finding of disability has been made concerning her in the years since the unlawful administrative orders began,” according to the Supreme Court petition. “She voluntarily underwent and passed three expert evaluations of her mental fitness and was reported as having the mental ability of someone decades younger,” the filing said.
The Federal Circuit has previously said that reports from doctors chosen by Newman for her legal battle have contradicted information provided to the committee, including statements from a physician that Newman cited.
Findings made by medical specialists consulted by the three-judge Judicial Council of the Federal Circuit showed “major errors” in a report from a California neurosurgeon and other exams Newman presented.
One issue, the council said, included the use of a “CT Perfusion scan” as a substitute for neuropsychological testing. According to Dr. James M. Noble, professor of neurology at Columbia University Irving Medical Center and one of the council’s medical consultants, this type of scan “can only demonstrate that a region of the brain is effectively receiving blood” and “even an area of the brain effectively receiving blood can still be dysfunctional,” per the doctor.
Newman’s team has claimed that she has been suspended longer than any judge in the “history of this country.”
“Preventing her from serving in her constitutionally appointed role poses a dire threat to judicial independence and infringes the separation of powers,” the NCLA has said.
A statement sent out by the group on Monday said Newman’s legal team was “disappointed” by the Supreme Court’s denial.
“It is a dark day for the independence of the federal judiciary,” said NCLA president Mark Chenoweth. “The cert denial in this case means that Judge Newman’s due process and other complaints about the way Chief Judge Moore and the Federal Circuit Judicial Council have treated her never have and never will receive a merits decision from an Article III court. That is utterly inexcusable and truly inexplicable.”
The U.S. Justice Department, which is representing the Federal Circuit, had said in court filings that the “sensible” decision would be for the Supreme Court to shoot down Newman’s appeal.
“The petition fails this court’s criteria for review many times over,” the DOJ argued. “Petitioner identifies no plausible conflict among the circuit courts warranting this court’s review.”
