Sykes joins four other Native American judges actively serving on the federal bench out of nearly 900 authorized federal judgeships. Those four are all women, and they are U.S. District Judges Lauren King, Diane Humetewa, Ada Brown, Lydia Kay Griggsby.

Carl Tobias, a federal judicial nominations expert and law professor at the University of Richmond, called it remarkable that its taken this long for a Native American person to hold a federal court seat in California, which is home to 109 federally recognized tribes.

The federal courts can have numerous profound effects on myriad Native American individuals and tribes, Tobias said, listing off reasons why diversity matters on the courts. Ethnic, gender and experiential diversity improve judicial decision-making, confine biases that can undercut federal court litigation, and increase public confidence in the federal courts when their judges reflect America.

For some context on the significance of Sykes confirmation, only seven Native Americans have ever served as federal judges in the 230-year history of the U.S. federal courts. Thats out of more than 4,200 people who have served as Article III judges (lifetime judges on U.S. district courts, appeals courts and the Supreme Court). Besides the five previously mentioned judges, including Sykes, the other two were U.S. District Judges Michael Burrage and Frank Howell Seay.

There has never been an Indigenous judge on a U.S. appeals court.