Judge Amul Thapar
Sixth Circuit U.S. District Court
Amul Roger Thapar was born in April 1969 in Troy, Michigan. He earned an undergraduate degree from Boston College and received his Juris Doctor from the University of California Berkeley School of Law. He clerked at the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Ohio and at the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. He engaged in private practice and was an adjunct professor at the University of Cincinnati College of Law.
He was also a trial advocacy instructor at the Georgetown University Law Center. He was an Assistant United States Attorney for the District of Columbia, before returning to private practice in Ohio. He was named as an Assistant United States Attorney for the Southern District of Ohio, and later nominated and confirmed to the position of United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Kentucky.
He was nominated by President George W. Bush for the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky, confirmed by the Senate, and received his commission in January 2008, serving there until his confirmation to the Sixth Circuit. President Donald Trump nominated Thapar to the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. He was confirmed in a 52-44 vote of the Senate and received his commission in May 2017.
He is married to Kim Shulte, and they have three children. He is a Catholic.
In the News…
A three-judge panel of the Sixth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals ruled in favor of an evangelical professor who was punished by Shawnee State University in Ohio for refusing to address a transgender student by the preferred pronoun.
Reversing a district court’s dismissal of his lawsuit against university officials, the appeals court ruled that the allegations made by the philosophy professor suggest the university may have violated the professor’s First Amendment rights.
“Traditionally, American universities have been beacons of intellectual diversity and academic freedom,” Judge Amul Thapar wrote in the opinion.
“They have prided themselves on being forums where controversial ideas are discussed and debated. And they have tried not to stifle debate by picking sides. But Shawnee State chose a different route: It punished a professor for his speech on a hotly contested issue. And it did so despite the constitutional protections afforded by the First Amendment. The district court dismissed the professor’s free-speech and free-exercise claims. We see things differently and reverse.”
The case has been remanded back to the lower court for “further proceedings consistent with this opinion.”
Contact this Leader…
Did you pray for Judge Thapar today? You can let him know at:
The Honorable Amul Thapar
Sixth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals
Potter Stewart U.S. Courthouse
100 East Fifth Street
Cincinnati, OH 45202
