Jenny Rivera (judge)

Rivera was born in December 1960 in New York City.[http://www.nycourts.gov/ctapps/jrivera.htm Hon. Jenny Rivera] at NY Court System She graduated from Princeton University in 1982. She earned her Juris Doctor from New York University School of Law three years later, and a Master of Laws from Columbia University School of Law in 1993.

After obtaining her Juris Doctor in 1985, Rivera spent a year clerking at the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit's Pro Se Law Clerk's office. She spent the next year as a staff attorney for the New York City Legal Aid Society in the Homeless Family Rights Project before joining the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund, where she remained as associate counsel until 1992. In 1992, Rivera served as an Administrative Law Judge for the New York State Division of Human Rights.

In 1993, after completing her LL.M. which focused on constitutional and feminist theory,{{Cite web |date=2013-01-15 |title=Jenny Rivera '93 LL.M. Graduate Nominated to State Appellate Court |url=https://www.law.columbia.edu/news/archive/jenny-rivera-93-llm-graduate-nominated-state-appellate-court |access-date=2025-01-20 |website=www.law.columbia.edu |language=en}} Rivera served as a law clerk to then-U.S. District Judge Sonia Sotomayor of the Southern District of New York; Sotomayor was later elevated to the Second Circuit and the U.S. Supreme Court. Following the completion of that clerkship, Rivera taught for three years at Suffolk University Law School.

Rivera joined the faculty of the City University of New York School of Law in 1997. She would teach there nearly continuously until her appointment to the New York Court of Appeals in 2013. From 2007 to 2008 Rivera was Special Deputy Attorney General for Civil Rights in the New York Attorney General's office and in 2011 she was a visiting professor at American University Washington College of Law.

Her selection to New York's highest court was controversial.{{cite news|last=Caher|first=John|title=Without Recommendation, COA Nominee Advances|url=http://www.newyorklawjournal.com/PubArticleNY.jsp?id=1202587074439&Without_Recommendation_COA_Nominee_Advances&slreturn=20130410151731|accessdate=February 10, 2013|newspaper=New York Law Journal|date=February 5, 2013}} Rivera was the first nominee in history to be advanced out of the New York State Senate's Judiciary Committee without recommendation. Nevertheless, she was confirmed by the full Senate on February 11, 2013.{{cite news|last=Nahmias|first=Laura|title=Lawmakers Confirm Rivera to State's Highest Court|url=https://blogs.wsj.com/metropolis/2013/02/11/lawmakers-confirm-rivera-to-states-highest-court/|accessdate=May 10, 2013|newspaper=The Wall Street Journal|date=February 2, 2013}}

In September 2021, Rivera was barred from entering the courthouse because she refused a COVID-19 vaccine; she was the only one of her colleagues to refuse the COVID-19 vaccine.{{Cite web |last1=Celona |first1=Larry |last2=Rosenberg |first2=Rebecca |date=October 4, 2021 |title=One of NY's most senior judges barred from courthouse over COVID-19 vaccine |url=https://nypost.com/2021/10/04/this-unvaxxed-ny-judge-is-now-barred-from-entering-the-courthouse/ |access-date=October 5, 2021 |website=New York Post |language=en-US}} In July 2022, Rivera announced that she would be receiving the Novavax COVID-19 vaccine.{{Cite web |last=Lee |first=Brian |date=July 26, 2022 |title=New York High Court Judge Says She's Now Ready to Be Vaccinated for COVID |url=https://www.law.com/newyorklawjournal/2022/07/26/new-york-high-court-judge-says-shes-now-ready-to-be-vaccinated/ |access-date=March 3, 2025 |website=New York Law Journal}}

==See also==

• List of Hispanic and Latino American jurists
• List of first women lawyers and judges in New York

{{Reflist}}

{{s-start}}

{{s-legal}}

{{s-before|before=Carmen Beauchamp Ciparick}}

{{s-ttl|title=Associate Judge of the New York Court of Appeals|years=2013–present}}

{{s-inc}}

{{s-end}}

{{Current New York statewide political officials}}

{{authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rivera, Jenny}}

Category:1960 births

Category:21st-century American judges

Category:21st-century American women judges

Category:Columbia Law School alumni

Category:Hispanic and Latino American judges

Category:Judges of the New York Court of Appeals

Category:Lawyers from New York City

Category:Living people

Category:New York University School of Law alumni

Category:Princeton University alumni