United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued April 24, 2025 Decided August 22, 2025

No. 24-5173

PAULINE NEWMAN, HONORABLE; CIRCUIT JUDGE,

APPELLANT

v.

KIMBERLY A. MOORE, HONORABLE; IN HER OFFICIAL

CAPACITIES AS CHIEF JUDGE OF THE UNITED STATES COURT OF
APPEALS FOR THE FEDERAL CIRCUIT, CHAIR OF THE JUDICIAL
COUNCIL OF THE FEDERAL CIRCUIT AND CHAIR OF THE
SPECIAL COMMITTEE OF THE JUDICIAL COUNCIL OF THE
FEDERAL CIRCUIT, ET AL.,
APPELLEES

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the District of Columbia
(No. 1:23-cv-01334)

Gregory Dolin argued the cause for appellant. With him

on the briefs were John J. Vecchione and Andrew Morris.
David C. Tryon was on the brief for amicus curiae the
Buckeye Institute in support of appellant.
Ilya Shapiro was on the brief for amici curiae Manhattan
Institute, et al. in support of appellant.
 2
Richard A. Samp was on the brief for amici curiae
Honorable Janice Rogers Brown, et al. in support of appellant.
Christopher A. Zampogna was on the brief for amicus
curiae the Bar Association of the District of Columbia in
support of appellant.
Melissa N. Patterson, Attorney, U.S. Department of
Justice, argued the cause for appellees. With her on the brief
were Brian M. Boynton, Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney
General, at the time the brief was filed, Mark R. Freeman and
Maxwell A. Baldi, Attorneys.
Probir K. Bondyopadhyay, Ph.D., pro se, was on the brief
for amicus curiae Probir K. Bondyopadhyay, Ph.D. in support
of appellees.
Before: MILLETT, PILLARD, and GARCIA, Circuit Judges.
Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge GARCIA.
GARCIA, Circuit Judge: The Judicial Councils Reform and
Judicial Conduct and Disability Act of 1980 empowers circuit
judicial councils to investigate allegations of misconduct or
disability lodged against fellow judges. The Act also
authorizes judicial councils to take “action” to address such
allegations, including by “ordering that, on a temporary basis
for a time certain, no further cases be assigned” to the judge in
question. 28 U.S.C. § 354(a)(1)–(2).
In 2023, a Special Committee of the Federal Circuit
opened an investigation into Judge Pauline Newman under the
Act. The Committee asked Judge Newman to undergo medical
examinations and produce medical records. Judge Newman
refused, contending that those requests and the Committee’s
investigation were unlawful. In response, the Federal Circuit’s
Judicial Council suspended Judge Newman from receiving
new case assignments for one year, subject to potential
 3
renewal. The Judicial Council in fact renewed that suspension
in September 2024, and it will decide whether to do so again in
September 2025.
In May 2023, Judge Newman filed this suit in district
court, contesting her suspension on multiple grounds. She
argued the Judicial Council violated her constitutional due
process rights by refusing to transfer the matter to another
circuit despite what she submits are stark conflicts of interest.
She claimed that the Act’s provision authorizing temporary
case-assignment suspensions is facially unconstitutional. She
contended, alternatively, that the case-suspension provision is
unconstitutional as applied to her, because she has been
effectively removed from office without being impeached.
And she argued that the Judicial Council exceeded its statutory
authority in imposing her suspension.
As the district court recognized, our ability to review
Judge Newman’s statutory and constitutional claims is largely
foreclosed by binding precedent. In McBryde v. Committee to
Review Circuit Council Conduct & Disability Orders of the
Judicial Conference of the United States, 264 F.3d 52 (D.C.
Cir. 2001), this court held that Congress precluded our
jurisdiction over statutory and as-applied constitutional
challenges to judicial council orders. Id. at 58–63. Instead,
McBryde concluded, Congress intended for those claims to be
considered exclusively by the Judicial Conference. Id. This
panel has no authority to depart from McBryde.
As a result, we have jurisdiction to consider only Judge
Newman’s facial constitutional challenge to the Act’s case-
suspension provision. Under well-settled standards for such
claims, that facial challenge fails because—irrespective of
whether the provision’s application to Judge Newman is
constitutional—Judge Newman agrees that the provision has
many other constitutional applications.
 4
We therefore affirm the district court’s judgment. As just
explained, however, our reasons for affirming are unrelated to
the strength of Judge Newman’s statutory claim or as-applied
constitutional claims. Nor does our decision reflect our views
of the underlying dispute or of Judge Newman’s suspension.
Under McBryde, any recourse for Judge Newman must come
from a judicial council or from the Judicial Conference, the
entity statutorily empowered to review council decisions.
I
A
The Judicial Councils Reform and Judicial Conduct and
Disability Act of 1980 “established a formal mechanism by
which federal judges could be disciplined by fellow judges for
‘conduct prejudicial to the effective and expeditious
administration of the business of the courts.’” Hastings v. Jud.
Conf. of U.S., 770 F.2d 1093, 1095 (D.C. Cir. 1985) (quoting
28 U.S.C. § 351(a)). The Act outlines the following
procedures.
First, “[a]ny person” may submit a complaint alleging
judicial misconduct or disability to the clerk of the circuit
where the accused judge sits. 28 U.S.C. § 351(a). The clerk
will then transmit the complaint to the circuit’s chief judge. Id.
§ 351(c). Alternatively, the chief judge may “identify a
complaint” on her own initiative. Id. § 351(b).
The Act contemplates that proceedings on a complaint will
ordinarily take place in the accused judge’s own circuit.
Congress, however, has also authorized the Judicial
Conference of the United States—a body which includes the
Chief Justice of the United States, the chief judge and a district
judge from each federal circuit, and the Chief Judge of the
Court of International Trade—to promulgate rules governing
the proceedings. See id. §§ 331, 358(a). One such rule
 5
provides that “[i]n exceptional circumstances, a chief judge or
a judicial council may ask the Chief Justice to transfer a
proceeding . . . to the judicial council of another circuit.” R.
for Jud. Conduct & Jud. Disability Procs. 26.
Upon receiving or identifying a complaint, the chief judge
may dismiss the complaint, “conclude the proceeding” because
“intervening events” render action unnecessary, or “certify the
complaint” to an investigative “special committee.” 28 U.S.C.
§§ 352(b), 353(a). A special committee usually consists of the
chief judge and two other judges. See id. § 353(a). If
appointed, the special committee will “conduct an investigation
as extensive as it considers necessary,” id. § 353(c), with “full
subpoena powers” at its disposal, id. § 356(a). Upon
completing the investigation, the committee will prepare “a
comprehensive written report,” including “recommendations,”
for the circuit’s judicial council, id. § 353(c)—a body that in
the Federal Circuit includes all active judges, see id.
§§ 332(a)(1), 363; Appellant’s Brief 4 n.1.
After receiving a special committee’s report, the circuit’s
judicial council may investigate further, and then must either
dismiss the underlying complaint, or “take . . . action” to
address it. 28 U.S.C. § 354(a). Potential “action” includes
formally censuring the judge or requesting that the judge retire.
Id. § 354(a)(2). The statute also authorizes a judicial council
to “order[] that, on a temporary basis for a time certain, no
further cases be assigned to the judge.” Id. § 354(a)(2)(A)(i).
The Act specifies, however, that judicial councils are
prohibited from “order[ing the] removal from office of any
[Article III] judge appointed to hold office during good
behavior.” Id. § 354(a)(3)(A).
Following consideration by a judicial council, complaints
can be reviewed by the Judicial Conference. See id. §§ 331,
357(a)–(b). A circuit’s judicial council may directly refer or
 6
certify any complaint to the Judicial Conference. Id.
§ 354(b)(1)–(2). Alternatively, a “complainant or judge
aggrieved by an action of the judicial council . . . may petition
the Judicial Conference . . . for review.” Id. § 357(a). Upon
review, the Conference is empowered to take any of the actions
available to a judicial council, or to inform the House of
Representatives that it believes impeachment is warranted. Id.
§ 355. The Conference has delegated that responsibility for
reviewing judicial council orders to its Committee on Judicial
Conduct and Disability (the JC&D Committee). See R. for Jud.
Conduct & Jud. Disability Procs. 21(a).
The Act, however, purports to preclude judicial review of
any orders issued during such proceedings. The Act provides
for only two forms of intrabranch review: the Judicial
Conference’s review of council orders, and a judicial council’s
review of certain orders issued by the circuit’s chief judge. See
28 U.S.C. §§ 352(c), 357(a). But except for those review
mechanisms, Section 357(c) of the Act—in a provision entitled
“No Judicial Review”—states that “all orders and
determinations, including denials of petitions for review, shall
be final and conclusive and shall not be judicially reviewable
on appeal or otherwise.” Id. § 357(c).
B
On March 24, 2023, Federal Circuit Chief Judge Kimberly
A. Moore initiated a complaint against Judge Newman, who
was then ninety-five years old and remained in active service.
Citing reports from court staff, Chief Judge Moore’s complaint
claimed that Judge Newman could no longer manage her
workload due to health- and age-related mental impairments.
The Chief Judge certified the complaint to a Special Committee
composed of herself and two other Federal Circuit judges.
As part of its investigation into the complaint, the Special
Committee asked Judge Newman to submit medical records
 7
and undergo independent neurological and neuropsychological
examinations. Judge Newman objected to the records’ and
tests’ relevance and refused to comply. She also requested that
the complaint be transferred to another circuit, arguing that due
process precluded the judges on her circuit’s Committee—
whom she described as her “accusers” and as “witnesses” to
relevant events—from also conducting the investigation and
adjudicating the complaint. J.A. 38–39 ¶ 33. The Committee
denied her transfer request without prejudice.
On July 31, 2023, the Committee submitted its report to
the Judicial Council. The report concluded that Judge
Newman’s noncooperation itself constituted misconduct, as
she had violated Judicial Conduct Rules prohibiting refusal to
cooperate in an investigation without good cause. See R. for
Jud. Conduct & Jud. Disability Procs. 4(a)(5). The Committee
recommended that Judge Newman be suspended from
receiving new case assignments for at least one year, subject to
renewal if her conduct continued.
On September 20, 2023, the Federal Circuit’s Judicial
Council issued an order affirming the Committee’s conclusions
and adopting its recommendation. Specifically, the Council
found that the Committee had a reasonable basis to request the
medical records and testing at issue, and it concluded that
Judge Newman had not shown good cause for her refusal to
comply. The Council ordered that Judge Newman not be
permitted to hear any new cases “for a period of one year, . . .
subject to consideration of renewal if [her] refusal to cooperate
continues after that time and to consideration of modification
or rescission if justified by an end of the refusal to cooperate.”
Jud. Council Order (Sept. 20, 2023), at 72–73. Judge Newman
petitioned the JC&D Committee for review of her suspension.
On February 7, 2024, the JC&D Committee affirmed the
Council’s order.
 8
In the meantime, Judge Newman filed this suit in district
court against Chief Judge Moore, the two other members of the
Special Committee, and the Judicial Council. As amended, her
complaint asserted eleven counts. Among them were
allegations that the Council’s proceedings violated her Fifth
Amendment due process rights, that her suspension was not
authorized by the Act, and that the Act’s case-suspension
provision was unconstitutional facially and as-applied.
The district court dismissed Judge Newman’s complaint
in part and granted the defendants’ motion for judgment on the
pleadings as to the remaining claims. The court concluded that
it lacked jurisdiction over Judge Newman’s as-applied and
statutory challenges and dismissed her facial constitutional
challenge on the merits. Judge Newman appealed.
Before this court, Judge Newman continues to press her
claim that the Council exceeded its statutory authority because
her suspension is not “temporary” and “for a time certain.” 28
U.S.C. § 354(a)(2)(A)(i). She also raises three constitutional
challenges to her suspension. First, she argues that the case-
suspension provision is facially unconstitutional. Second, she
asserts that the provision is unconstitutional as it has been
applied to her because it has resulted in her unlawful removal
from office. The Constitution, Judge Newman emphasizes,
provides that Article III judges “shall hold their Offices during
good Behaviour.” U.S. Const. Art. III, § 1. And, she submits,
the only method to remove a judge from her “Office[]” is
impeachment. See Appellant’s Brief 27. In Judge Newman’s
view, because she no longer has pending cases to decide, she
cannot exercise judicial power and the suspension has, in
effect, unconstitutionally removed her from “Office[]” without
impeachment. Appellant’s Brief 23–28. Third, Judge
Newman brings an as-applied challenge that the Council
violated “basic norms of Due Process” by declining to transfer
her case to another circuit, and instead “having the same
 9
individuals act as both witnesses and adjudicators.” Id. at 55–
56, 58–60.
In September 2024, while this appeal was pending, the
Federal Circuit’s Judicial Council renewed Judge Newman’s
suspension for a second year. And in July 2025, the Special
Committee recommended that her suspension be renewed for a
third year.
II
The district court dismissed Judge Newman’s as-applied
constitutional claims and statutory claim for lack of
jurisdiction. Our court reviews that dismissal de novo.
Statewide Bonding, Inc. v. DHS, 980 F.3d 109, 114 (D.C. Cir.
2020). We affirm. Binding circuit precedent dictates that
federal courts lack jurisdiction to review those claims.
A
Recall that Section 357(c) of the Act provides that “all
orders and determinations” of a judicial council or the Judicial
Conference “shall not be judicially reviewable on appeal or
otherwise.” 28 U.S.C. § 357(c). By its plain text, that
provision appears to explicitly preclude judicial review of all
challenges to covered orders.
The Supreme Court, however, has long instructed that a
“serious constitutional question . . . would arise if a federal
statute were construed to deny any judicial forum for a
colorable constitutional claim.” Webster v. Doe, 486 U.S. 592,
603 (1988) (citation modified). Thus, “a statutory bar to
judicial review” is understood to “preclude[] review of
constitutional claims only if there is ‘clear and convincing’
evidence that the Congress so intended.” Ralls Corp. v. Comm.
on Foreign Inv. in U.S., 758 F.3d 296, 308 (D.C. Cir. 2014)
(citation omitted). To ascertain the scope of an explicit
preclusion provision like Section 357(c), our court “examine[s]
 10
both the text of the statute and the legislative history” and asks
whether there is “clear-and-convincing evidence” of
“congressional intent to bar judicial review of constitutional
claims.” Id. at 309.
Twenty-four years ago, our court applied those principles
to determine the preclusive scope of Section 357(c). See
McBryde v. Comm. to Rev. Cir. Council Conduct & Disability
Ords. of Jud. Conf. of U.S., 264 F.3d 52, 58–63 (D.C. Cir.
2001). In McBryde, we considered a judge’s statutory and
constitutional challenges to a judicial council order imposing
sanctions under the Act. See id. at 54–55. We held that Section
357(c) explicitly precluded that judge’s statutory claims. Id. at
59, 63–64. And we used the clear-and-convincing-evidence
test to determine that Section 357(c) precluded some of that
judge’s constitutional claims. Id. at 58–63. Specifically, our
court held that Section 357(c) did not preclude facial
constitutional challenges given the “serious constitutional
question” that would arise if such claims could not be brought
in any forum. Id. at 58 (quoting Webster, 486 U.S. at 603). We
also held, however, that Section 357(c) did “preclude review in
the courts for as applied constitutional claims.” Id. at 62–63.
In the Act’s legislative history, we discerned “clear and
convincing” evidence of Congress’s intent to channel review
of as-applied challenges to the Judicial Conference alone and
away from federal courts. Id.1

1
As this description of McBryde reflects, our court has treated
judicial councils and the Judicial Conference as administrative rather
than judicial bodies. See McBryde, 264 F.3d at 62–63; Hastings v.
Jud. Conf. of U.S., 829 F.2d 91, 103–04 (D.C. Cir. 1987); cf. also
Chandler v. Jud. Council of Tenth Cir., 398 U.S. 74, 83–86 (1970)
(declining to resolve this issue). Neither party challenges that
treatment before our panel. The appellees do, however, “preserve”
for later review the argument that these entities should be understood
 11
McBryde’s jurisdictional holding was unambiguous:
Section 357(c) bars from federal court statutory and as-applied
constitutional challenges to judicial council or Judicial
Conference orders issued under the Act. Id. at 59, 62–63.
We are bound by a prior panel decision “unless
intervening Supreme Court precedent” has “effectively
overrule[d], i.e., eviscerate[d]” that decision. Alpine Sec. Corp.
v. Fin. Indus. Regul. Auth., 121 F.4th 1314, 1334 (D.C. Cir.
2024) (citation modified). Neither our court nor the Supreme
Court has reconsidered the scope of Section 357(c) (or altered
the clear-and-convincing-evidence test) since McBryde was
decided. And McBryde has not otherwise been overruled or
meaningfully undermined. We therefore may not review Judge
Newman’s statutory challenge or as-applied constitutional
challenges.
B
Judge Newman resists that conclusion principally by
arguing that McBryde has been effectively overruled and so no
longer forecloses review of statutory challenges or as-applied
constitutional challenges. We are not persuaded.
Judge Newman first claims that McBryde’s holding
respecting statutory challenges was eviscerated by the Supreme
Court’s decision in SAS Institute, Inc. v. Iancu, 584 U.S. 357
(2018). That case, she says, suggests that even an explicit
statutory bar cannot preclude judicial review of claims that an
agency exceeded its statutory authority. See Appellant’s Brief
52–53. But SAS Institute says no such thing. That case applied
the same principles as McBryde to a differently worded
preclusion provision. And the Court permitted that petitioner’s
challenge to proceed because the preclusion provision by its

as judicial in nature, in which case their decisions would not be

subject to district court review at all. See Appellees’ Brief 31 n.7.
 12
terms did not encompass the petitioner’s challenge. The
provision there stated that a “determination by the Director [of
the Patent Office] whether to institute an inter partes review
under this section shall be final and nonappealable.” SAS Inst.,
584 U.S. at 370 (quoting 35 U.S.C. § 314(d)) (emphasis
added). But the petitioner challenged how the Director
conducted his inter partes review—not the Director’s
determination of “whether to institute” such review—so that
challenge was not precluded. Id. at 370–71. Judge Newman
does not argue that the order imposing her suspension
somehow falls outside the category of “all orders and
determinations” described in Section 357(c). And SAS Institute
is irrelevant to the argument she does make: that Section 357(c)
cannot bar any argument that a judicial council exceeded its
statutory authority.2
Judge Newman also fails to show that McBryde’s holding
regarding as-applied constitutional challenges has been
eviscerated.

2
Judge Newman’s brief also might be read as suggesting that,
despite Section 357(c), we can review her statutory challenge under
cases allowing us to review agency overreach of statutory authority
that is “so extreme that one may view it as jurisdictional or nearly
so.” Griffith v. Fed. Lab. Rels. Auth., 842 F.2d 487, 493 (D.C. Cir.
1988). She makes any such argument in (at most) a “skeletal”
manner, and so it is forfeited. See N.Y. Rehab. Care Mgmt., LLC v.
NLRB, 506 F.3d 1070, 1076 (D.C. Cir. 2007) (quotation omitted).
And even if we considered her claim, the exception she invokes has
only been applied to statutory schemes raising questions of implicit
preclusion, not to explicit preclusion provisions like the one at issue
here. See Changji Esquel Textile Co. v. Raimondo, 40 F.4th 716, 722
(D.C. Cir. 2022). The exception is also exceedingly narrow—as the
Supreme Court recently reiterated, it is “essentially a Hail Mary pass
[that] in court as in football, . . . rarely succeeds.” Nuclear Regul.
Comm’n v. Texas, 605 U.S. 665, 681–82 (2025) (citation modified).
 13
First, Judge Newman argues that McBryde’s holding was
undermined by Congress’s 2002 addition of a severability
clause to the Act. That clause states: “If any provision of this
subtitle . . . or the application of such provision . . . to any
person or circumstance is held to be unconstitutional, the
remainder of this subtitle . . . and the application of the
provisions of such to any person or circumstance shall not be
affected thereby.” 28 U.S.C. § 351 Note. Judge Newman
argues that the provision’s text—by imagining that an
application of the Act could be found unconstitutional—
“expressly contemplates ‘as applied’ challenges to the Act
being adjudicated in Article III courts.” Appellant’s Brief 60.
We disagree. The clause does not state that Article III
courts can consider as-applied challenges. And although it
contemplates some entity finding applications of the Act
unconstitutional, it is possible Congress envisioned that a
judicial council or the Judicial Conference (not an Article III
court) could make such findings. Our court in McBryde, after
all, concluded that the Judicial Conference could decide such
claims. See 264 F.3d at 62, 68. At the least, the clause does
not provide clear evidence of Congressional intent to, in effect,
partly repeal Section 357(c) as it was understood in McBryde.
See United States v. Hansen, 772 F.2d 940, 944 (D.C. Cir.
1985) (“[R]epeals by implication are not favored, and will not
be found unless an intent to repeal is clear and manifest.”
(citation modified)).
Second, Judge Newman argues that the Judicial
Conference has declined to consider constitutional issues in the
years since McBryde was decided. Its failure to do so, she says,
undermines McBryde’s reasoning, which emphasized
Congress’s intent to channel review of those claims to the
Judicial Conference. See 264 F.3d at 62–63.
 14
Whatever the Judicial Conference’s current practices are,
they do not undermine McBryde. When McBryde was decided,
the Judicial Conference declined to pass on constitutional
issues. See id. at 62. The McBryde court acknowledged as
much and conceded that it had no power to order the Judicial
Conference to begin hearing such claims (though it urged the
Conference to do so). See id. at 62, 68. Our court’s reasoning
thus never depended on the Conference in fact reviewing
constitutional claims. Instead, our holding rested on the
finding that Congress had—clearly and convincingly—
intended that the Conference, rather than courts, review as-
applied challenges (even if the Conference in fact shirked its
duty). See id. at 59–61.3
Third and finally, Judge Newman turns to the Supreme
Court’s opinions in Axon Enterprise, Inc. v. FTC, 598 U.S. 175
(2023), and Free Enterprise Fund v. Public Company
Accounting Oversight Board, 561 U.S. 477 (2010). On her

3
The parties debate whether judicial councils and the Judicial
Conference have in fact begun to address constitutional issues in this
case and others since McBryde. Counsel for appellees represents that
the Judicial Council agrees it can address as-applied constitutional
challenges, and appellees identify one other JC&D Committee
decision that, in their view, considered and rejected a Fourth
Amendment challenge. See Tr. of Oral Arg. 64; Appellees’ Brief 49
(citing In re Complaint of Judicial Misconduct, C.C.D. No. 17-01
(U.S. Jud. Conf. Aug. 14, 2017), at 30–34). In this case, however,
neither the Judicial Council’s orders nor the JC&D Committee’s
decision explicitly reflects genuine consideration of Judge
Newman’s constitutional arguments. None of the orders appear to
address any argument by Judge Newman that her suspension violates
the Constitution by effectively removing her from office. The JC&D
Committee acknowledged that Judge Newman argued for a transfer
in constitutional terms, In re Complaint No. 23-90015, C.C.D. No.
23-01 (U.S. Jud. Conf. Feb. 7, 2024), at 14, 21, but its order does not
much discuss constitutional due process case law.
 15
view, those cases held that all constitutional questions “are
outside the scope of agencies’ expertise” and so must be
reviewable in federal courts. Appellant’s Brief 62. Those
holdings, she says, undermine McBryde’s conclusion that
Congress intended to route review of as-applied challenges
exclusively to the Judicial Conference.
Judge Newman overreads Axon and Free Enterprise Fund.
Most simply, those cases did not involve an explicit statutory
bar on judicial review, and so did not address the same type of
legal question as did McBryde. In Axon and Free Enterprise
Fund, entities facing agency investigations or enforcement
actions sued in district court, arguing that the agencies at issue
were unconstitutionally structured. See Axon, 598 U.S. at 180;
Free Enter. Fund, 561 U.S. at 487. As the Court emphasized,
neither case involved an explicit jurisdiction-stripping
provision like Section 357(c). See Free Enter. Fund, 561 U.S.
at 489 (“[T]he text does not expressly limit the jurisdiction . . .
[of] district courts.”); see also Axon, 598 U.S. at 185. Instead,
the agencies claimed that Congress’s creation of a scheme of
administrative review, followed by review in a court of
appeals, implicitly precluded district court suits challenging the
agencies’ actions. See Axon, 598 U.S. at 184–88; Free Enter.
Fund, 561 U.S. at 489–91. In such a case, rather than the clear-
and-convincing-evidence test McBryde applied, courts deploy
a different doctrinal framework stemming from Thunder Basin
Coal Co. v. Reich, 510 U.S. 200 (1994). See Axon, 598 U.S at
185–86; Free Enter. Fund, 561 U.S. at 489–91. That
difference alone defeats any argument that Axon or Free
Enterprise Fund eviscerates McBryde’s reading of Section
357(c)’s explicit bar on judicial review.
A further weakness in Judge Newman’s analogy is also
worth noting. She seizes on the Court’s explanation that the
SEC and FTC were comparatively inexpert as compared to
district courts in evaluating constitutional claims. See Axon,
 16
598 U.S. at 194–95; Free Enter. Fund, 561 U.S. at 491. But it
is far from clear that concern applies equally to judicial
councils or the Judicial Conference. Those entities are, after
all, composed exclusively of Article III judges.
C
Taking a different tack, Judge Newman argues that, even
if McBryde generally remains good law, its reasoning does not
apply to her specific as-applied challenges. This line of
argument also proves unpersuasive.
To start, Judge Newman contends that McBryde held in a
footnote that Section 357(c) did not cover as-applied
challenges (like hers) to long-term disqualifications from
hearing cases. That footnote states: “Obviously, we do not
decide whether a long-term disqualification from cases could,
by its practical effect, [e]ffect an unconstitutional ‘removal.’”
McBryde, 264 F.3d at 67 n.5. Through that footnote, she
argues, McBryde promised that a court would have jurisdiction
to consider that type of as-applied challenge if it arose.
That reading is implausible. McBryde squarely held—in
an earlier section of the opinion—that Section 357(c) reflects
Congress’s intent “to preclude review in the courts for as
applied constitutional claims.” Id. at 62–63. The footnote
appears in the panel’s later discussion of McBryde’s facial
challenge and does not purport to modify the court’s
jurisdictional holding.
Next, Judge Newman argues that McBryde does not
preclude review of her due process challenge to the Judicial
Council’s refusal to transfer her case. The Act, she notes, does
not explicitly provide for Judicial Conference review of a
council’s decision to transfer (or not transfer) a case. And she
argues that McBryde’s rationale cannot apply to her due
 17
process claim because it turned on the availability of review
before the Judicial Conference.
Judge Newman may be right that the Act provides no
means to petition the Conference for interlocutory review of
the Council’s transfer decision. But the Act does provide for
Conference review of any final council action stemming from
a case that was not transferred. See 28 U.S.C. § 357(a)–(b).
Judge Newman’s due process challenge to the Council’s
transfer decision can thus be raised to the Conference as part of
a petition challenging the Council’s final action in this case.
Indeed, Judge Newman challenged the Judicial Council’s
denial of her transfer request in her 2023 petition for review of
the Council’s initial suspension order, and the JC&D
Committee addressed it. See In re Complaint No. 23-90015,
C.C.D. No. 23-01 (U.S. Jud. Conf. Feb. 7, 2024), at 15–22.
Judge Newman cannot show that McBryde has been
eviscerated or that her specific claims escape its grasp. We thus
lack jurisdiction over her statutory and as-applied
constitutional challenges.
III
We do have jurisdiction over Judge Newman’s facial
challenge to the Act’s case-suspension provision, see McBryde,
264 F.3d at 58, and now turn to the merits of that challenge.
In a facial challenge, the plaintiff asks a court to look
beyond the facts of her own case and declare a statutory
provision unconstitutional in all its applications. Facial
challenges thus strain against the many “good reasons” that
“courts usually handle constitutional claims case by case, not
en masse.” Moody v. NetChoice, LLC, 603 U.S. 707, 723
(2024). As a result, under longstanding precedent, such
challenges are quite difficult to make out. To succeed in a
facial challenge, a plaintiff must show that “no set of
 18
circumstances exists under which the law would be valid” or
“that the law lacks a plainly legitimate sweep.” Comm. on
Ways & Means v. Dep’t of Treasury, 45 F.4th 324, 339 (D.C.
Cir. 2022) (quoting Ams. for Prosperity Found. v. Bonta, 594
U.S. 595, 615 (2021); United States v. Salerno, 481 U.S. 739,
745 (1987)) (citation modified). Put differently, the plaintiff
must demonstrate that the provision at issue does not have
any—or at least not many—constitutional applications.
Judge Newman’s own concessions demonstrate that she
cannot meet that settled standard. She challenges 28 U.S.C.
§ 354(a)(2)(A)(i), which authorizes judicial councils to
“order[] that, on a temporary basis for a time certain, no further
cases be assigned to the judge whose conduct is the subject of
a complaint.” But Judge Newman concedes that, under that
provision, short suspensions from receiving new case
assignments can be constitutional at least as long as the judge
still has cases left to decide—while a judge clears a mounting
backlog of opinions, for example. See Reply Brief 6, 9;
Appellant’s Brief 41–43. In fact, both our court and the
Supreme Court have suggested the same (albeit in dicta). See
McBryde, 264 F.3d at 65; Chandler v. Jud. Council of Tenth
Cir., 398 U.S. 74, 85 (1970). Judge Newman thus cannot show
that there is “no set of circumstances . . . under which the law
would be valid” or that it “lacks a plainly legitimate sweep.”
Comm. on Ways & Means, 45 F.4th at 339 (citation modified).
Indeed, Judge Newman does not attempt to make that showing.
Judge Newman’s argument instead proceeds as though she
needs to show only that some portion of the statute’s
applications are unconstitutional. She accordingly argues that
her lengthy suspension is unconstitutional, and that if the
provision authorizes that suspension and similar ones, it must
be facially unconstitutional.
 19
That argument misunderstands the law governing facial
constitutional challenges. To be sure, in the First Amendment
context, statutes may sometimes be deemed facially invalid
where only a subset of their applications are unconstitutional.
See United States v. Hansen, 599 U.S. 762, 769 (2023). But
that unique way of evaluating facial challenges—called
“overbreadth doctrine”—“[b]reak[s]” from the ordinary rules
for evaluating such claims to “guard against” the potential that
even partly unconstitutional laws “may deter or ‘chill’
constitutionally protected speech.” Id. at 769–70 (citation
modified). Given that other types of constitutional challenges
do not raise those same concerns, however, courts “have not
recognized an ‘overbreadth’ doctrine outside the limited
context of the First Amendment.” Salerno, 481 U.S. at 745;
accord Metro. Wash. Chapter, Associated Builders &
Contractors, Inc. v. District of Columbia, 62 F.4th 567, 577
(D.C. Cir. 2023). This is not a First Amendment case.
Overbreadth doctrine does not apply. So Judge Newman’s
theory fails.
Judge Newman further urges us to adopt a “narrowing
construction” of the statute. Appellant’s Brief 41–42. She asks
us to find that case suspensions like hers are at least
constitutionally suspect and construe the case-suspension
provision not to authorize such suspensions to avoid a
potentially serious constitutional flaw. See Crowell v. Benson,
285 U.S. 22, 62 (1932). But a narrowing construction can be
justified only if a party first raises a serious constitutional
question. See id. Here, the only claim properly before us is
Judge Newman’s facial challenge. And as just explained, that
challenge does not present a close question. We therefore have
no occasion to consider a narrowing construction.
 20
IV
We have now resolved all issues presented in this case.
Before concluding, however, we emphasize two points.
First, we do not consider—because we cannot consider—
the merits of Judge Newman’s as-applied constitutional claims.
Judge Newman has posed important and serious questions
about whether these Judicial Conduct and Disability Act
proceedings comport with constitutional due process principles
and whether her ongoing suspension comports with the
structure of our Constitution. That we do not answer those
questions is no indication that her arguments lack merit, nor
signals how we might have addressed them if we were able. As
already discussed, precedent strips us of authority to consider
those challenges. We do not reach them for that reason alone.
Second, as a panel of this court, we are unable to overrule
McBryde, and so do not resolve whether McBryde was rightly
decided. To be sure, there are substantial arguments that—if
judicial councils and the Conference are properly regarded as
administrative bodies—the McBryde majority misapplied the
clear-and-convincing-evidence test when interpreting Section
357(c). Judge Tatel’s partial dissent articulated several such
arguments: The McBryde majority may have applied the clear-
and-convincing-evidence test more loosely than our court had
in prior cases, in part because it thought that as-applied
constitutional claims would still be heard by “a reviewing
‘agency’ composed exclusively of Article III judges.”
McBryde, 264 F.3d at 62; see id. at 73–76 (Tatel, J., concurring
in part and dissenting in part) (citing Ungar v. Smith, 667 F.2d
188, 193, 195 n.2, 196 (D.C. Cir. 1981); Griffith v. Fed. Lab.
Rels. Auth., 842 F.2d 487, 490, 494–95 (D.C. Cir. 1988)). It
relied on a potentially strained reading of the relevant
legislative history. See id. at 74–76. And its holding could be
taken to suggest that certain constitutional questions might be
 21
heard in no forum (if the Judicial Conference does not consider
those challenges) and that, regardless, the Judicial
Conference—not the Supreme Court—would be the last word
on major questions of constitutional law. See id. at 75.
The seeming absence of a judicial forum to address
Newman’s as-applied constitutional claims itself raises
constitutional concerns. See Webster, 486 U.S. at 603. Judge
Newman presents substantial arguments that her suspension—
which has now lasted nearly two years, with a third year
recommended—threatens the principle of judicial
independence and may violate the separation of powers. She
further contends that the refusal to transfer her case to a
different circuit deprived her of an impartial tribunal, which if
correct would raise due process concerns. See, e.g., Gibson v.
Berryhill, 411 U.S. 564, 579 (1973); In re Murchison, 349 U.S.
133, 136–37 (1955).
Those doubts, however, would at most suggest that
McBryde was wrong the day it was decided, not that it does not
bind us now. (Indeed, many of those arguments were presented
when McBryde was issued, and our full court nonetheless
denied en banc review. See McBryde v. Comm. to Rev. Cir.
Council Conduct & Disability Ords. of Jud. Conf. of U.S., 278
F.3d 29, 29 (D.C. Cir. 2002) (per curiam).)
The result of faithfully applying McBryde is that Judge
Newman cannot raise her as-applied constitutional arguments
in any Article III forum.4 It is thus up to the Judicial Council
and the Judicial Conference to genuinely engage with those
arguments.

4
Appellees suggested at oral argument that the Supreme Court
may be able to review Judicial Conference orders via mandamus.
See Tr. of Oral Arg. 71–74. We express no opinion on that
possibility.
 22
V
The judgment of the district court is affirmed.
So ordered.