Born in Seoul, South Korea, Lee came to the U.S. with his parents and three sisters at age four following the 1979 military coup in South Korea. Lee grew up in the Koreatown neighborhood of Los Angeles. His father operated a spray paint equipment repair shops, and his mother was a pharmacist and acupuncturist; neither spoke English, so they insisted that he understand the language and did not allow him to attend a Korean church. Lee earned his Bachelor of Artssumma cum laude from Cornell University in 1997, and his Juris Doctormagna cum laude from Harvard Law School in 2000. While attending Cornell, Lee wrote for the conservative and libertarian campus newspaper The Cornell Review.
Early legal career
After graduating from law school, Lee served as a law clerk to Judge Emilio M. Garza of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit from 2000 to 2001. Lee then worked as an associate at New York City law firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz from 2001 to 2006. At Wachtell, following the September 11 attacks, Lee served as second chair, deposed witnesses, and wrote briefs as part of the legal team representing real estate mogul Larry Silverstein, whose 99-year lease of the World Trade Center provided a $3.5 billion insurance policy for an act of terrorism. The court ruled that the separate plane crashes in the World Trade Center represented 1.4 occurrences of terrorism. In 2005, Lee served as a special counsel on the United States Senate Judiciary Committee. From 2006 to 2009, Lee was associate counsel and special assistant to President George W. Bush. After Bush left office in 2009, Lee joined the Los Angeles office of the law firm Jenner & Block as a partner. From 2010 to 2011, Lee served as an adjunct faculty member at Pepperdine University School of Law. Lee has litigated consumer class action lawsuits across the U.S. in the food, technology, and healthcare sectors. He has argued appeals before a number of federal circuit courts. In his pro bono practice, Lee has represented a number of indigent and incarcerated individuals. He is a member of the Food Law Committee of the Litigation Section of the State Bar of California. In 2018, Lee was named one of the "Most Influential Minority Attorneys" by the Los Angeles Business Journal.
Federal judicial service
On October 10, 2018, President Trump announced his intent to nominate Lee to serve as a United States Circuit Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. Both California Senators Dianne Feinstein and Kamala Harris announced their opposition to his nomination. On November 13, 2018, his nomination was sent to the Senate. President Trump nominated Lee to the seat vacated by Judge Stephen Reinhardt, who died on March 29, 2018. On January 3, 2019, his nomination was returned to the President under Rule XXXI, Paragraph 6 of the United States Senate. On January 30, 2019, President Trump indicated that he would renominate Lee to a Ninth Circuit vacancy. On February 6, 2019, his nomination was sent to the Senate. On March 13, 2019, a hearing on his nomination was held before the Senate Judiciary Committee. During the hearing, he was questioned about college writings covering AIDS, political correctness, and feminism. He apologized for the writings, saying he regretted them and was embarrassed by them. On April 4, 2019, his nomination was reported out of committee by a 12–10 party line vote. The Wall Street Journal editorial board responded to the questioning about Lee's college writings: "...what Mr. Lee wrote in college is of no relevance to how he’d behave as a jurist.... What liberals really don’t like is that Mr. Lee dissented from progressive doctrines on racial preferences, among other issues." On May 14, 2019, the Senate invoked cloture on his nomination by a vote of 50–45. On May 15, 2019, the Senate confirmed his nomination by a vote of 52–45. He received his judicial commission on June 12, 2019. Lee is the nation's first Article III judge who was born in the Republic of Korea and the second Korean American to serve on the Ninth Circuit.
Memberships
Lee is listed as an expert for The Federalist Society and has been a Federalist Society speaker and panelist on the topics of Food & Drug Law, Class Actions, and the Constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act.
