James C. Ho is a Circuit Judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.  Before taking the bench on January 4, 2018, he was co-chair of the national Appellate and Constitutional Law practice group and partner in the Dallas office of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher. 

As an appellate litigator for over a decade, including three years as the Solicitor General of Texas, Judge Ho won numerous appeals, including three merits cases at the U.S. Supreme Court.  He was routinely ranked among the nation’s leading lawyers by Benchmark, Chambers, Law360, The Legal 500, and The National Law Journal, among other publications.  His work as amicus counsel was favorably cited by courts at every level of the federal and Texas judiciaries.  He won a Best Brief Award from the National Association of Attorneys General every year that he served as solicitor general, and he is the only state solicitor general ever invited by the U.S. Supreme Court to express the views of a state.

Judge Ho has served in all three branches of the federal government.  On the Senate Judiciary Committee, he served as chief counsel of the Subcommittees on the Constitution and Immigration under Senator John Cornyn.  At the Justice Department, he served as Special Assistant to the Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights and attorney-advisor at the Office of Legal Counsel.  He clerked for Judge Jerry E. Smith of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit and Justice Clarence Thomas of the U.S. Supreme Court.

His record of public service also includes appointments as vice chair of the Federal Judicial Evaluation Committee in Texas, and member of the National Constitution Center Board of Trustees, the Continuity of Government Commission, and the U.S. delegation to the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination.  In addition, Judge Ho has served as an Adjunct Professor of Law at the University of Texas School of Law and senior editor of The Green Bag.

Judge Ho has received the Ronald Reagan Jurisprudence Award from the Claremont Institute, the Lee Liberman Otis Award for Distinguished Service from the Federalist Society, the Defender of the Constitution Award from the Heritage Foundation, the Jurist of the Year Award from the Texas Review of Law & Politics, and the Selfless Service Award from the Journal of Law & Civil Governance at Texas A&M.

Taiwanese by birth and Texan by marriage, Judge Ho graduated from Stanford University with honors and a B.A. in Public Policy in 1995, and the University of Chicago Law School with high honors in 1999.  Before law school, he was a legislative aide to California State Senator Quentin Kopp.  He and his wife Allyson live in Dallas, Texas, with their twin daughter and son.