James Louis Robart (born September 2, 1947) is a
senior United States district judge of the
United States District Court for the Western District of Washington.
Early life and education
Robart was born in
Seattle
Seattle ( ) is a seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the seat of King County, Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest regio ...
,
Washington
Washington commonly refers to:
* Washington (state), United States
* Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States
** A metonym for the federal government of the United States
** Washington metropolitan area, the metropolitan area centered o ...
, in 1947.
Robart's father, Victor Robart, worked for
Standard Oil of California as a ship captain.
[Dana Luthy]
Profile of Judge James L. Robart
Federal Bar Association of the Western District of Washington News, Vol. 27, No. 1 (Summer 2004), pp. 11 & 13. James Robart grew up in the Richmond Beach neighborhood of
Shoreline, Washington
Shoreline is a city in King County, Washington, United States. It is located between the city limits of Seattle and the Snohomish County border, approximately north of Downtown Seattle. As of the 2020 census, the population of Shoreline was 58 ...
, and graduated from Shoreline High School, where he was
student body president
The student government president (sometimes called "student ''body'' president," "student ''council'' president" or "''school'' president") is generally the highest-ranking officer of a student union. While a student government group and a class p ...
.
He attained the rank of
Eagle Scout
Eagle Scout is the highest achievement or rank attainable in the Scouts BSA program of the Boy Scouts of America (BSA). Since its inception in 1911, only four percent of Scouts have earned this rank after a lengthy review process. The Eagle S ...
.
Robart received a
Bachelor of Arts
Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four year ...
degree ''magna cum laude'' from
Whitman College
Whitman College is a private liberal arts college in Walla Walla, Washington. The school offers 53 majors and 33 minors in the liberal arts and sciences, and it has a student-to-faculty ratio of 9:1. Whitman was the first college in the Pacific ...
in 1969 and a
Juris Doctor from
Georgetown University Law Center
The Georgetown University Law Center (Georgetown Law) is the law school of Georgetown University, a private research university in Washington, D.C. It was established in 1870 and is the largest law school in the United States by enrollment and ...
in 1973.
As a law student, he was administrative editor of the ''
Georgetown Law Journal
''The Georgetown Law Journal'' is a student-edited scholarly journal published at Georgetown University Law Center. It is the flagship law review of the Georgetown University Law Center.
Overview
The ''Georgetown Law Journal'' is headquartere ...
''.
He also was a
legislative assistant to United States Representative
John Dellenback and worked with
Henry M. "Scoop" Jackson on the
Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act
The Alaska Native Claims Settlement Act (ANCSA) was signed into law by President Richard Nixon on December 18, 1971, constituting at the time the largest land claims settlement in United States history. ANCSA was intended to resolve long-standing ...
.
Legal career
From 1973 to 2004, Robart was in private practice in Seattle with the
law firm of Lane Powell Moss & Miller (later Lane Powell Spears Lubersky LLP and then
Lane Powell PC
Lane Powell PC is an American law firm based in Seattle, Washington (state), Washington, with offices in Anchorage and Portland Oregon, Portland. The firm was established in 1875, making it one of the Pacific Northwest’s oldest and longest-runn ...
).
He specialized in civil litigation.
He was the chair of the firm's Litigation Department from 1992 to 1998,
and was managing partner at the firm in 2003 and 2004.
As an attorney, Robart tried numerous cases, including high-profile litigation related to Washington's
Initiative 695,
in which he successfully represented the cities of
Bainbridge Island
Bainbridge Island is a city and island in Kitsap County, Washington. It is located in Puget Sound. The population was 23,025 at the 2010 census and an estimated 25,298 in 2019, making Bainbridge Island the second largest city in Kitsap County.
...
,
Bremerton
Bremerton is a city in Kitsap County, Washington. The population was 37,729 at the 2010 census and an estimated 41,405 in 2019, making it the largest city on the Kitsap Peninsula. Bremerton is home to Puget Sound Naval Shipyard and the Bremer ...
and
Lakewood in both the trial court and the
Washington Supreme Court
The Washington Supreme Court is the highest court in the judiciary of the U.S. state of Washington. The court is composed of a chief justice and eight associate justices. Members of the court are elected to six-year terms. Justices must retir ...
.
He did
pro bono work with Evergreen Legal Services, and independently represented Southeast Asian refugees.
He is a fellow of the
American College of Trial Lawyers
The American College of Trial Lawyers (ACTL) is a professional association of trial lawyers from the United States and Canada. Founded in 1950, the College is dedicated to maintaining and improving the standards of trial practice, especially trial ...
.
Robart has been president of the Seattle Children's Home and former trustee of the Children's Home Society of Washington.
[Mica Rosenberg & Nathan Layne]
'So-called judge' derided by Trump known for fairness, work with youth
Reuters (February 4, 2017).
Robart has been a trustee of his ''alma mater'' Whitman College, and was chair of the college's Board of Overseers.
Federal judicial service
On December 9, 2003, Robart was nominated by President
George W. Bush
George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician who served as the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Republican Party, Bush family, and son of the 41st president George H. W. Bush, he ...
to a seat on the
United States District Court for the Western District of Washington vacated by
Thomas S. Zilly.
He received a unanimous "well-qualified" rating from the
American Bar Association
The American Bar Association (ABA) is a voluntary bar association of lawyers and law students, which is not specific to any jurisdiction in the United States. Founded in 1878, the ABA's most important stated activities are the setting of aca ...
's
Standing Committee on the Federal Judiciary. Robart was unanimously confirmed by the
United States Senate
The United States Senate is the upper chamber of the United States Congress, with the House of Representatives being the lower chamber. Together they compose the national bicameral legislature of the United States.
The composition and pow ...
on June 17, 2004, and received his commission on June 21, 2004. He took
senior status
Senior status is a form of semi- retirement for United States federal judges. To qualify, a judge in the federal court system must be at least 65 years old, and the sum of the judge's age and years of service as a federal judge must be at leas ...
on June 28, 2016.
Notable cases
Robart presided over a case in which a
street performer (busker) raised a constitutional challenge to
Seattle Center
Seattle Center is an arts, educational, tourism and entertainment center in Seattle, Washington, United States. Spanning an area of 74 acres (30 ha), it was originally built for the 1962 World's Fair. Its landmark feature is the tall Space Needle ...
rules regulating performers' conduct. In 2005, Robart held that some of the regulations, such as those requiring performers to wear badges and barring them from performing within 30 feet of people waiting in line, were a prior restraint and violated performers' constitutional right to
freedom of speech.
[Paul Shukovsky]
Seattle Center limits on street performers OK'd
''Seattle Post-Intelligencer'' (January 9, 2008). On appeal, a three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit initially reversed in a 2-1 decision, holding that the regulations were valid.
After a rehearing ''en banc'', the Ninth Circuit upheld Robart's ruling, concluding that the challenged rules did not "qualify as reasonable time, place, or manner restrictions" under the current record.
In 2005, in the case of ''ASF Inc. v. City of Seattle'', Robart struck down the City of Seattle's effective ban on
strip clubs, finding that the city's 17-year moratorium on granting adult entertainment licenses constituted an unconstitutional
prior restraint
Prior restraint (also referred to as prior censorship or pre-publication censorship) is censorship imposed, usually by a government or institution, on expression, that prohibits particular instances of expression. It is in contrast to censorship ...
.
In 2011, Robart dismissed a lawsuit brought by
phone book
A telephone is a telecommunications device that permits two or more users to conduct a conversation when they are too far apart to be easily heard directly. A telephone converts sound, typically and most efficiently the human voice, into ele ...
companies against the City of Seattle. The companies challenged the city's law that created a "yellow book" opt-out registry, allowing residents to cancel deliveries of phone books. Robart found that the ordinance was a permissible restraint on
commercial speech
In law, commercial speech is speech or writing on behalf of a business with the intent of earning revenue or a profit. It is economic in nature and usually attempts to persuade consumers to purchase the business's product or service. The Supreme ...
. On appeal, however, the
U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, disagreed and reversed.
In 2012 Robart presided over a
breach of contract matter between
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational technology corporation producing computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at the Microsoft Redmond campus located in Redmond, Washin ...
and
Motorola
Motorola, Inc. () was an American multinational telecommunications company based in Schaumburg, Illinois, United States. After having lost $4.3 billion from 2007 to 2009, the company split into two independent public companies, Motorol ...
, which determined a
reasonable and non-discriminatory
Reasonable and non-discriminatory (RAND) terms, also known as fair, reasonable, and non-discriminatory (FRAND) terms, denote a voluntary licensing commitment that standards organizations often request from the owner of an intellectual property r ...
royalty rate for a portfolio of
standard essential patents, including for several
802.11
IEEE 802.11 is part of the IEEE 802 set of local area network (LAN) technical standards, and specifies the set of media access control (MAC) and physical layer (PHY) protocols for implementing wireless local area network (WLAN) computer com ...
("WiFi") and
H.264
Advanced Video Coding (AVC), also referred to as H.264 or MPEG-4 Part 10, is a video compression standard based on block-oriented, motion-compensated coding. It is by far the most commonly used format for the recording, compression, and distr ...
video-encoding patents.
In August 2016, Robart presided over a 2012
consent decree requiring the
Seattle Police Department
The Seattle Police Department (SPD) is the principal law enforcement agency of the city of Seattle, Washington, United States, except for the campus of the University of Washington, which is under the responsibility of its own police department ...
to address federal allegations of
police bias
Bias is a disproportionate weight ''in favor of'' or ''against'' an idea or thing, usually in a way that is closed-minded, prejudicial, or unfair. Biases can be innate or learned. People may develop biases for or against an individual, a group, ...
. During the hearing, he said "black lives matter."
Robart was assigned to ''
Microsoft v. United States'', a case brought in 2016 by
Microsoft Corp. (with support by other tech companies, including
Apple
An apple is an edible fruit produced by an apple tree (''Malus domestica''). Apple trees are cultivated worldwide and are the most widely grown species in the genus ''Malus''. The tree originated in Central Asia, where its wild ancestor, ' ...
,
Google
Google LLC () is an American Multinational corporation, multinational technology company focusing on Search Engine, search engine technology, online advertising, cloud computing, software, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, ar ...
, and
Amazon
Amazon most often refers to:
* Amazons, a tribe of female warriors in Greek mythology
* Amazon rainforest, a rainforest covering most of the Amazon basin
* Amazon River, in South America
* Amazon (company), an American multinational technolog ...
) against the
U.S. Department of Justice
The United States Department of Justice (DOJ), also known as the Justice Department, is a federal executive department of the United States government tasked with the enforcement of federal law and administration of justice in the United State ...
, challenging the provision of the federal
Stored Communications Act that bars companies from alerting customers to
secret government surveillance of their emails. In February 2017, Robart denied the government's
motion to dismiss
In United States law, a motion is a procedural device to bring a limited, contested issue before a court for decision. It is a request to the judge (or judges) to make a decision about the case. Motions may be made at any point in administrati ...
, finding that Microsoft had made a plausible
First Amendment
First or 1st is the ordinal form of the number one (#1).
First or 1st may also refer to:
*World record, specifically the first instance of a particular achievement
Arts and media Music
* 1$T, American rapper, singer-songwriter, DJ, and reco ...
argument that these "gag orders" were akin to "permanent injunctions preventing speech from taking place before it occurs" and therefore failed
strict scrutiny. Robart wrote: "The public debate has intensified as people increasingly store their information in the
cloud
In meteorology, a cloud is an aerosol consisting of a visible mass of miniature liquid droplets, frozen crystals, or other particles suspended in the atmosphere of a planetary body or similar space. Water or various other chemicals may ...
and on devices with significant storage capacity. Government surveillance aided by
service providers
A service provider (SP) is an organization that provides services, such as consulting, legal, real estate, communications, storage, and processing services, to other organizations. Although a service provider can be a sub-unit of the organization t ...
creates unique considerations because of the vast amount of data service providers have about their customers."
On February 3, 2017, Robart granted a temporary restraining order against President
Donald Trump
Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021.
Trump graduated from the Wharton School of the University of P ...
's
executive order on travel and immigration, pending review of a
lawsuit brought by Washington Attorney General
Bob Ferguson. Trump responded via
Twitter
Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...
, calling the opinion "ridiculous" and disparaging Robart as a "so-called judge".
[Jim Brunner]
Trump's 'so-called judge' is a highly regarded GOP appointee
''Seattle Times'' (February 4, 2017). These comments prompted criticism from some members of Congress and commentators who claimed it endangered the
independence of the judiciary Judicial independence is the concept that the judiciary should be independent from the other branches of government. That is, courts should not be subject to improper influence from the other branches of government or from private or partisan inter ...
. On February 9, a three-judge panel of the Ninth Circuit unanimously upheld Robart's order and rejected the federal government's request for an emergency stay pending appeal.
On December 23, 2017, Robart granted a nationwide injunction that blocks
the administration’s restrictions on the process of
reuniting refugee families and partially lifted a ban on refugees from 11 mostly Muslim countries.
On July 24, 2020, Robart granted a restraining order on behalf of the justice department overruling a Seattle city ban on the use of teargas and impact munitions.
Personal life
Robart married Mari Jalbing in November 1980.
The two have been
foster parent
Foster care is a system in which a minor has been placed into a ward, group home (residential child care community, treatment center, etc.), or private home of a state- certified caregiver, referred to as a "foster parent" or with a family me ...
s for many years, mostly for children from
southeast Asia
Southeast Asia, also spelled South East Asia and South-East Asia, and also known as Southeastern Asia, South-eastern Asia or SEA, is the geographical south-eastern region of Asia, consisting of the regions that are situated south of mainlan ...
.
Presentation of James L. Robart, Nominee To Be District Judge for the Western District of Washington, by Hon. Patty Murray, a U.S. Senator from the State of Washington
S. Hrg. 108-135, Pt. 6, United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary
The United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary, informally the Senate Judiciary Committee, is a standing committee of 22 U.S. senators whose role is to oversee the Department of Justice (DOJ), consider executive and judicial nominations ...
, 108th Congress.
Robart is an avid fisherman and has for many years taken annual fishing trips to Langara Island
Langara Island, known as Kiis Gwaii to the Haida ( Haida: ''Ḵ'íis Gwáayaay''), is the northernmost island of Haida Gwaii in British Columbia, Canada. The island is approximately in size. It is located approximately south of Alaska.
Hist ...
, British Columbia
British Columbia (commonly abbreviated as BC) is the westernmost province of Canada, situated between the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains. It has a diverse geography, with rugged landscapes that include rocky coastlines, sandy beaches, ...
. He is also a frequent reader of biographies, citing William Manchester
William Raymond Manchester (April 1, 1922 – June 1, 2004) was an American author, biographer, and historian. He was the author of 18 books which have been translated into over 20 languages. He was awarded the National Humanities Medal and the ...
's unfinished Churchill biography as his favorite. He is known for often wearing a bow tie
The bow tie is a type of necktie. A modern bow tie is tied using a common shoelace knot, which is also called the bow knot for that reason. It consists of a ribbon of fabric tied around the collar of a shirt in a symmetrical manner so that t ...
along with his judicial robes.
References
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Robart, James Louis
1947 births
Living people
Georgetown University Law Center alumni
Judges of the United States District Court for the Western District of Washington
Lawyers from Seattle
United States district court judges appointed by George W. Bush
21st-century American judges
Whitman College alumni