Trump nominates former O’Scannlain clerk to O’Scannlain’s 9th Circuit seat

President Donald J. Trump made his first nomination to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Thursday, picking a man described as a traditional conservative.

However, confirmation of the nominee, Oregon assistant U.S. attorney Ryan Bounds, must overcome a few roadblocks.

Oregon’s two Democratic senators, Ron Wyden and Jeff Merkley, sent a letter to the White House the same day, indicating that they did not intend to return a blue slip for the president’s pick.

Bounds was not approved by Oregon’s bipartisan judicial selection committee, the letter indicated, which prompted the senators’ opposition.

This nomination could be another test of whether Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee, will honor the blue slip process — which allows home state senators to essentially have veto power over judicial nominations.

Sen. Al Franken, D-Minnesota, has refused to sign off on Trump’s pick for an 8th Circuit seat, Minnesota Supreme Court Judge David Stras, imperiling his nomination.

Bounds’ name came to the White House by way of U.S. Rep. Greg Walden, R-Oregon.

A career government lawyer, Bounds has been an assistant U.S. attorney in Portland, Oregon since 2010.

Before that, he was a federal prosecutor in Washington, D.C., and in the George W. Bush administration as an adviser on criminal and civil justice issues.

He also was a deputy assistant attorney general and chief of staff in the Office of Legal Policy at the U.S. Department of Justice.

Prior to his career as a public lawyer, Bounds was an associate at Stoel Rives LLP.

Bounds has no prior judicial experience.

In his letter to Trump, Walden touted Bounds’ conservative credentials, describing him as “the rare Oregonian with a sincere commitment to conservative jurisprudence.”

However, lawyers who know Bounds described him as a traditional conservative, but cautioned against pigeonholing him as an ideologue.

“He’s not someone who looks just at the letter of the law. He looks at a big picture,” said James S. Azadian, who chairs the 9th Circuit appellate lawyer representative panel, on which Bounds sits.

Azadian noted that Bounds is an active member of the group, which advises 9th Circuit judges, and suggested at a circuit conference in July that the court should allow attorneys who cannot afford to make it to oral arguments to appear by videoconference, as many 9th Circuit judges currently do.

Ben Feuer, who also sits on the panel, said that the president’s nominee has “traditional, conservative, federalist jurisprudential views,” adding that “any Republican president would be happy to appoint Bounds.”

If he is confirmed, Bounds would fill the seat left vacant by Judge Diarmuid F. O’Scannlain, for whom he clerked after graduating from Yale Law School in 1999.

This likely would make Bounds the first person nominated to the 9th Circuit to sit in the seat of a judge for whom he clerked, the court’s archivist Rollins Emerson said.

O’Scannlain was happy with the president’s pick.

“I am proud of Ryan’s nomination. He has the perfect resume and experience for appointment to this court,” O’Scannlain said in an email.

Professor Arthur D. Hellman of University of Pittsburgh School of Law, who follows the 9th Circuit closely, said that Bounds mirrored many of Trump’s picks for the federal judiciary who are young and have excellent conservative and educational credentials.