District court service

On February 28, 2000, Lynch was nominated by President Bill Clinton to a seat on the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York vacated by John E. Sprizzo. After Lynch was nominated to the district court in 2000, some Senate Republicans expressed concerns that he was a judicial activist, citing a previous warning in writings by Lynch warning the legal community not to overemphasize words from "18th- and 19th-century dictionaries" when interpreting the United States Constitution.^[5] However, as part of a deal between Senate Democrats and Republicans that also paved the way for a vote to confirm Clinton's nomination of Republican Bradley A. Smith to the Federal Election Commission and Federal Circuit nominee Timothy B. Dyk,^[6] Lynch was confirmed by the United States Senate on May 24, 2000, by a 63–36 vote,^[7] and he received his commission the following day. His service as a district court judge was terminated on September 21, 2009, when he was elevated to the court of appeals.^[2]

As a district court judge, Lynch presided over the perjury trial of rap artist Lil' Kim in 2005. He sentenced her to a year and a day in jail.^[8] Judge Lynch is also an active participant in Legal Outreach, a non-for-profit organization in which he mentors inner-city kids in New York.

Court of appeals service

On April 2, 2009, President Barack Obama nominated Lynch to a seat on the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit vacated by Judge Chester J. Straub, who assumed senior status on July 16, 2008.^[9] Lynch was confirmed by the United States Senate on September 17, 2009, by a 94–3 vote,^[10][11] and received his commission the following day.^[2] Lynch assumed senior status on September 5, 2016.^[2]

Notable cases as appellate judge

• On May 7, 2015, Lynch wrote an opinion for the Second Circuit in Manhattan, ruling that the systematic collection of American's phone records by the NSA is illegal. He referred to the program as "an unprecedented contraction of the privacy expectations of all Americans", advancing the national debate started by the revelations of Edward Snowden.^[12]
• On May 31, 2017, Lynch wrote an opinion for the Second Circuit in Manhattan, affirming the conviction and life sentence of Ross William Ulbricht, a/k/a "Dread Pirate Roberts," for operating the Silk Road (marketplace) underground website, that was responsible for the distribution of over $200 million of drugs and other contraband between 2011 and October 2013.^[13]

• On February 26, 2018, Lynch authored a dissenting opinion in Zarda v. Altitude Express, Inc., in which he disagreed with the court's holding that Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act applies to sexual-orientation discrimination in the workplace.^[14]
• In 2021, Lynch wrote for a panel which reversed the Southern District of New York in Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, Inc. v. Goldsmith, holding that Warhol's use of Goldsmith's photograph of Prince as the basis for a series of his own portraits of the musician was not sufficiently transformative to qualify as fair use. The Supreme Court affirmed the decision in 2023.^[15]