Maryanne Trump Barry

Maryanne Trump Barry (April 5, 1937 – November 13, 2023) was an American attorney and United States federal judge.

Barry was born Maryanne Trump in the Queens borough of New York City on April 5, 1937, the eldest child of real estate developer Fred Trump and his wife Mary Anne MacLeod Trump.

She was the eldest sister of Donald Trump.

She attended Kew-Forest School.

She graduated cum laude with a BA from Mount Holyoke College in 1958, and an MA in public law and government from Columbia University in 1962.

She became an assistant United States attorney in 1974 and was first appointed to the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey by President Ronald Reagan in 1983.

She later attended law school, earning her JD from Hofstra University School of Law in 1974.

After being a homemaker for 13 years, Barry became an assistant United States attorney in 1974, one of only two women out of 62 lawyers in the office of the United States Attorney for the District of New Jersey.

She was in the civil division from 1974 to 1975 and in the appeals division from 1976 to 1982, serving as deputy chief of that division from 1976 to 1977 and chief of the division from 1977 to 1982.

She served as Executive Assistant United States Attorney from 1981 to 1982.

She was First Assistant United States Attorney from 1981 to 1983.

On September 14, 1983, Barry was nominated by President Ronald Reagan to a seat on the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey vacated by Henry Curtis Meanor.

She was confirmed by the United States Senate on October 6, 1983, and received her commission the next day.

According to her niece Mary L. Trump, Donald Trump influenced his lawyer Roy Cohn to get Barry the commission, which Donald waged against Barry, prompting her to state that she had earned the position.

In 1985, she recused herself in a drug-trafficking case due to her brother Donald's relationship with the accused trafficker.

In 1989, while a district court judge in Newark, New Jersey, she disapproved a plea bargain that would have freed two county detectives accused of protecting a drug dealer, and forced the case to trial.

The detectives were convicted and received jail terms.

She also presided over the conviction of Louis Manna, the Genovese crime family mobster accused of plotting to assassinate rival John Gotti.

The refugee petitioner was the nephew of former Gambian president Dawda Jawara, who had been deposed in a coup in 1994; the new regime had imprisoned or killed several of Cham's relatives and outlawed their political party.

Barry ruled in favor of Abou Cham; criticized Judge Donald Ferlise's questioning over a two-day hearing as bullying, belligerent, and abusive toward "an increasingly distraught petitioner"; and concluded that Cham had been "ground to bits" emotionally.

Barry wrote that there was "not a modicum of courtesy, of respect or of any pretense of fairness" in Ferlise's treatment of Cham, which led Ferlise to conclude that Cham's testimony was not credible, and concluded that the Immigration Court's ruling was a "severe wound" on the American justice system.

Ferlise was relieved of his duties shortly after Barry's decision.

She was nominated to fill the vacancy created when H. Lee Sarokin retired in 1996.

(Clinton had nominated Robert Raymar to the seat in 1998, but that nomination expired at the end of that year without being given a hearing by the Senate Judiciary Committee.)

In 1999, she was appointed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit by President Bill Clinton.

Her service in the district court ended on October 25, 1999, when she was elevated to the court of appeals.

Barry's reputation on the bench was that of a tough judge with strong command of her courtroom.

A Republican, Barry was nominated to serve on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit by Democratic President Bill Clinton on June 17, 1999.

The U.S. Senate unanimously confirmed Barry on September 13, 1999.

She received her commission on September 22, 1999.

Barry told the New Jersey Law Journal in 1999 that she was "deeply honored and very grateful for the nomination" and was "surprised [to be] approached on it", stating, "I assume that my record is good enough as a district court judge to be reached out to, and I'm glad that politics weren't a priority here".

In January 2006, Barry testified before the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee in support of the nomination of her colleague Samuel Alito to the U.S. Supreme Court.

In January 2006, Barry testified to support the appointment of fellow Third Circuit Judge Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court.

In a 2006 ruling, Abou Cham v. Attorney General, Barry was harshly critical of the conduct of a U.S. Immigration Court judge in a case involving a refugee from The Gambia.

She took senior status in June 2011, and announced her retirement from the bench in February 2019 after an investigation was launched into allegations that she had committed judicial misconduct by participating in fraudulent tax and financial transactions.

Barry was the elder sister of former president Donald Trump.

On June 30, 2011, Barry assumed senior status.

She took inactive senior status in the first week of February 2017, about two weeks after her brother's inauguration as president.

Barry retired on February 11, 2019.

Her retirement ended an investigation of whether she had engaged in fraudulent tax schemes with her siblings that violated judicial conduct rules.