Judge Brett Kavanaugh addresses the assembled audience in the East Room of the White House moments after President Donald Trump nominated him to be an associate justice at the U.S. Supreme Court after Justice Anthony Kennedy announced his retirement from the court. July 9, 2018.
With the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh as associate justice to the U.S. Supreme Court, many in the tech and privacy world have started to wonder how the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit judge will fill the void left by former Justice Anthony Kennedy, who retired in late June.
But if his past opinions are any guide, Kavanaugh, who was a former law clerk to Kennedy, may not be all that different from his predecessor on privacy and technology issues. Like Kennedy, Kavanaugh is hesitant to expand Fourth Amendment protections in situations concerning law enforcement collection of digital information, and leans on a broad interpretation of the First Amendment when deciding whether to regulate the digital economy.
