North Carolina Solicitor General Ryan Park (Photo: NC Department of Justice)

The Senate appears set to vote on North Carolina Solicitor General Ryan Park for a seat on the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals after months of opposition by Republican senators Ted Budd and Thom Tillis.

The Senate Judiciary Committee voted to advance Park’s nomination to the floor against Budd and Tillis’s wishes in a party line 11-10 vote last Thursday. The two senators have maintained since July that Democrats “do not have the votes for confirmation” and that Park’s nomination is a “non-starter.”

With all Republicans expected to opposed the nomination, the Senate will first need to vote on a motion for cloture before proceeding to a vote on Park’s confirmation. As of Monday, the date for a cloture vote had not yet been announced.

Who is Ryan Park?

Park, a Harvard Law graduate, was named solicitor general by Attorney General Josh Stein in 2020. He defended the University of North Carolina in the challenge to its race-conscious admissions practices by Students for Fair Admissions — a case that ultimately saw the Supreme Court overturn affirmative action in higher education.

James Wynn — Judge James A. Wynn, an Obama appointee, announced his retirement from the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals earlier this year. Park was nominated to succeed him. (File photo)

The appointment, if successful, would not change the ideological composition of the Fourth Circuit. The seat was previously held by Judge James A. Wynn, an Obama appointee best known for his majority opinions finding that new North Carolina election laws infringed on the voting rights of minority groups and that North Carolina’s congressional districts were unconstitutionally gerrymandered.

A child of Korean immigrants, Park would be the first Asian American appointed to the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, which encompasses North Carolina, South Carolina, Maryland, Virginia, and West Virginia. The Fourth Circuit is among the more liberal appeals courts in the country, with nearly two-thirds of its judges appointed by Democratic presidents.

Park clerked for Supreme Court justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and David Souter before joining the New York-based law firm of Boies, Schiller & Flexner in 2014. He was named North Carolina’s deputy solicitor general in 2017 before ascending to the top post three years later.

Opposition to Park’s bid

Park — alongside virtually all judges nominated by President Joe Biden in the final months of his administration — has faced vehement opposition by Republicans in the Senate. Whether he can clear the chamber depends on the attendance of senators and voting decisions by independents who caucus with the Democrats.

“This nominee has no prayer of getting confirmed by the full U.S. Senate unless Chuck Schumer and my colleagues on the other side of an aisle play a game and wait for a funeral or an illness to cause an absentee problem on our side,” Tillis said at Thursday’s Judiciary hearing.

U.S. Senator Thom Tillis maintained that Park does not have the votes to be confirmed at the Judiciary hearing to advance his nomination to the Senate floor last week. (Photo: U.S. Senate video stream)

Tillis and other Republicans have cited progressive stances taken by Park, particularly during his work in Stein’s attorney general office, as cause for their objections. In a 2016 opinion piece for the Washington Post defending Ginsburg, Park condemned Trump for “overt racism” and “disdain for the rule of law and our constitutional system” — statements he took back during his hearing before the judiciary committee.

Under the Trump administration, Senate Republicans ended the practice of requiring “blue slip” approval for appeals court nominees. Previously, a judge would only go before the Senate for a confirmation hearing with the backing of both home state senators.

The Biden administration presented Tillis and Budd with four potential nominees for the circuit court position, including former North Carolina Supreme Court Chief Justice Cheri Beasley — an inclusion the Republican senators found objectionable, as she was Budd’s opponent in the 2022 Senate race.

Tillis and Budd responded with four other proposed nominees, though the administration declined to move forward with any of them.

Spokespeople for Tillis and Budd did not respond to requests for comment on Park’s bid.

The math on Park’s nomination

Democrats would be able to lose only a single vote at full attendance with their thin majority in the Senate.

Tillis claimed in August that he “had secured support among Democrats” to block Park’s nomination, though he has not to date provided names of senators agreeing to do so — and reiterated Thursday that “you can bank on” his rejection by the full Senate.

Senator Joe Manchin III (I-W.V.) said in March he would oppose any Biden nominees without Republican support, but walked back that position days ago. Senator Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz.) opposed Judge Nancy Maldonado for the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals in August — alongside Manchin.

Tillis is viewed as the most vulnerable incumbent senator up for reelection in 2026, and as such, is believed to be among the most likely senators to break with Trump on his upcoming cabinet confirmation votes. But Tillis threatened that the vote on Park against his wishes might push him away from taking moderate positions in the upcoming Congress.

“I’m kind of wondering what Thom Tillis needs to show up in the Trump administration,” he said, threatening to “reflexively” vote the party line. “I’m not talking about the merits now, folks, I’m talking about you telling me how you want me to behave in a future administration.”

According to FiveThirtyEight, Tillis voted with Trump’s position 90.6% of the time, making him a more reliable GOP vote than 40 of the Republican senators who served during the first Trump administration.

The Senate confirmed another Biden appeals court nominee, Embry Kidd of Florida, to the Eleventh Circuit in a 49-45 vote Monday evening. Like Park, he was nominated to replace a Democratic president’s appointee — Charles Wilson, named by Bill Clinton — and was opposed by his state’s two Republican senators. Manchin voted against Kidd’s confirmation, while Sinema voted in favor. Six other senators were absent from the vote.

Senate advances nomination of NC Solicitor General Ryan Park for Fourth Circuit over GOP opposition