Rao was appointed to the DC Court of Appeals in 2018 to replace Brett Kavanaugh after he joined the Supreme Court. She was also on Trump's shortlist for SCOTUS.
She served as a law clerk to Thomas in 2001.
Prior to being appointed to one of the most powerful courts in the nation, Rao served as head of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs in July 2017, where she helped defend the Trump administration's agenda, per The New York Times.
In 2020, she ruled in Trump's favor by dissenting in two cases over presidential powers, pushing back on a ruling that grand jury information from the Mueller report on Russian interference should be shared with the House Judiciary Committee.
"Judge Neomi Rao has served less than a year of her lifetime appointment to the DC Circuit, and I fear the damage she will do if she keeps putting politics and her allegiance to this president above the law," Sen. Patrick Leahy, a Democrat from Vermont, said in a statement at the time, per a report by Roll Call.