Who is Sonia Maria Sotomayor?
A: She is an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States.
Where was Sotomayor born?
A: In the New York City borough of The Bronx.
Who is her father?
A: Her father was Juan Sotomayor from the area of Santurce, San Juan, Puerto
Rico.
Who was her mother?
A: Her mother was Celina Báez, an orphan from the neighborhood of Santa Rosa
in Lajas, a rural area on Puerto Rico's southwest coast.
Sotomayor was raised a what?
A: Catholic.
Where did she grow up?
A: In Puerto Rican communities in the South Bronx and East Bronx.
The family lived in a South Bronx tenement before
moving to where in 1957 to where?
A: The well-maintained, racially, and ethnically mixed, working-class
Bronxdale Houses housing project in Soundview.
Her relative proximity to Yankee Stadium led to her
becoming a lifelong what?
A: Fan of the New York Yankees.
Sonia grew up with an alcoholic father and a mother who
was what?
A: Emotionally distant.
Who did she feel closest to?
A: Her grandmother, who she later said gave her a source of "protection and
purpose".
Sonia was diagnosed with what condition at age seven?
A: Type 1 diabetes.
Her father died of heart problems at age what age?
A: 42, when she was nine years old.
After this, she became fluent in what language?
A: English.
Sotomayor has said that she was first inspired by what?
A: The strong-willed Nancy Drew book character.
She was inspired to go into a legal career and become a
judge by watching what?
A: The Perry Mason television series.
Where did Sotomayor attend grammar school?
A: Sotomayor attended Blessed Sacrament School in Soundview where she was
valedictorian and had a near-perfect attendance record.
Although underage, Sotomayor worked where?
A: At a local retail store and a hospital.
Sotomayor passed the entrance tests for and then
attended what high school?
A: Cardinal Spellman High School in the Bronx.
At Cardinal Spellman, Sotomayor was on what team?
A: The forensics team and was elected to the student government.
She graduated as “what” in 1972.
A: A valedictorian.
Sotomayor entered Princeton University on a what?
A: A full scholarship.
She would describe her time at Princeton as a what?
A: A life-changing experience.
Initially, she felt like what?
A: A visitor landing in an alien country.
During her freshman year she was too intimidated to do
what?
A: To ask questions.
Her writing and vocabulary skills were weak, and she
lacked knowledge in the what?
A: The classics.
Academically, Sotomayor stumbled her first year at
Princeton but later received almost all A's in her final what?
A: Two years of college.
On August 14, 1976, just after graduating from
Princeton, Sotomayor married whom?
A: Kevin Edward Noonan, whom she had dated since high school.
In 1979, Sotomayor was awarded what?
A: A Juris Doctor from Yale Law School.
Sotomayor and Noonan divorced amicably in what year?
A: 1983.
In 1984, she entered private practice, joining what?
A: The commercial litigation practice group of Pavia & Harcourt in Manhattan
as an associate.
One of 30 attorneys in the law firm, she specialized in
what?
A: Intellectual property litigation, international law, and arbitration.
Sotomayor was appointed by Mayor Ed Koch in 1988 as one
of what?
A: One of the founding members of the New York City Campaign Finance Board,
where she served for four years.
During 1985 and 1986, Sotomayor served on the board of
the Maternity Center Association, a Manhattan-based non-profit group which
focused on what?
A: Improving the quality of maternity care.
Sotomayor had wanted to become a judge since when?
A: She was in elementary school.
In 1991 she was recommended for a spot by what
Democratic New York senator?
A: Daniel Patrick Moynihan.
Sotomayor was thus nominated on November 27, 1991, by
whom to a seat on the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New
York vacated by John M. Walker Jr.?
A: President George H. W. Bush.
Sotomayor became the youngest judge in the Southern
District and the first Hispanic federal judge where?
A: In New York State.
She became the first Puerto Rican woman to serve as a
what?
A: A judge in a U.S. federal court.
As a trial judge, she garnered a reputation for being
well-prepared in advance of a case and moving cases along a what?
A: A tight schedule.
On July 28, 2009, the Senate Judiciary Committee voted
how in favor of Sotomayor's nomination?
A: 13–6.