In 2022, Ketanji Brown Jackson was sworn in as the 116th Supreme Court justice, becoming the first Black woman to serve on the court in its 233-year history. Jackson took the oath of office to replace departing Justice Stephen Breyer.
She formerly served as a district judge in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia from 2013 to 2021. President Joe Biden nominated her to fill Merrick Garland’s seat on the D.C. Circuit in June 2021, following Garland’s confirmation as attorney general. Jackson has previously clerked for three federal courts, including Breyer himself from 1999 to 2000.
The judge’s ascension to the position of first Black woman on the Supreme Court was not easy. Unlike several of her colleagues on the nine-member bench, her climb to the Supreme Court has yet to result in massive wealth.
Forbes estimates her net worth at $2 million, making her the least wealthy justice alongside Brett Kavanaugh. Furthermore, the business journal reported that half of her net worth is tied up in her Washington, D.C. house, with the remainder kept in an investment portfolio and a stake in a holiday property.
Her net worth is projected to climb as her book is released later this year, and she has a hefty pension to look forward to when she quits. Penguin Random House will release her memoir, “Lovely One,” in September, following a $3 million book contract inked in 2022.
Jackson was born in Washington, DC, and raised in Miami by parents who both graduated from historically black colleges. Jackson holds two degrees from Harvard University, where she studied both as an undergraduate and as a law student, and she previously served as editor of the Harvard Law Review. According to the BBC, she spearheaded protests against a Harvard student who hung a Confederate flag in his dorm window.
After graduation, Jackson served as a clerk for two judges before moving on to various employment in Boston and Washington, DC. According to Forbes, she never stayed in one post for long, working at a boutique business before leaving after nine months to work as a clerk for Justice Stephen Breyer, whom she later replaced at the Supreme Court.
She also took up another associate position at a prominent law firm in Boston and was appointed counsel at an appellate firm in 2009. She was thereafter named vice chair of the Sentencing Commission and began receiving a salary of $184,500, which Forbes described as “likely a drop from private practice.”
In 2012, she was appointed to a lifetime position as a judge in the District of Columbia District Court. Her declared net worth was just under $700,000, which included $340,000 in investments and retirement funds. In March 2013, she was confirmed at a new salary of $174,000. By 2021, her pay had risen considerably to $218,600. When she was nominated to the D.C. Circuit, she had a net worth of $1.7 million.
By the time President Biden nominated her to the Supreme Court, Jackson’s net worth had risen to $1.8 million, according to Senate papers published by Forbes.
Forbes thinks that the sum has increased to roughly $2 million.