Early life and education
Jones was born and raised in Athens, Georgia and graduated from Cedar Shoals High School.Allison FloydJudicial career
Georgia state judicial service
Jones served as a municipal court judge in Athens-Clarke County, Georgia, Athens-Clarke County from 1993 to 1995. In 1995, Gov. Zell Miller appointed Jones to be a Courts of Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia Superior Court judge for the Western Judicial Circuit, which includes Clarke County, Georgia, Clarke and Oconee County, Georgia, Oconee counties.Federal judicial service
In April 2009, Jones was one of three candidates recommended by Democratic Party (United States), Democratic members of the United States congressional delegations from Georgia#House of Representatives, Georgia House delegation to replace judge Hugh Lawson (judge), Hugh Lawson on the United States District Court for the Middle District of Georgia.Joe JohnsonNotable decisions
Awaiting a decision in a Louisiana abortion case pending before the U.S. Supreme Court, in October 2019, Jones issued a temporary injunction against enforcement of a new Georgia law regulating abortions that was to go into effect January 1, 2020. The law is one of the nation’s strictest as it outlaws abortion in most cases once fetal cardiac activity can be detected. After the U.S. Supreme Court ruling struck down the Louisiana abortion law on July 13, 2020, Jones issued his final order striking down the Georgia law, finding the statute violated a woman’s constitutional right to access to abortion as established by the 1973 U.S. Supreme Court ruling in ''Roe v. Wade''. Jones wrote, “It is in the public interest, and is this court’s duty, to ensure constitutional rights are protected.” The ruling reinstated Georgia's previous statute passed in 2012 allowing abortions through 20 weeks of gestation, or approximately 22 weeks of pregnancy. A spokesman for the Attorney General of Georgia, Georgia Attorney General’s Office said the state would appeal the ruling. On December 17, 2019, Jones appeared in multiple news headlines after declining in an interlocutory order to stop a voter caging, purge of 309,000 Georgia voters from the state's list of registered voters. Jones later found that plaintiff Fair Fight Action and other plaintiffs had not shown that they were likely to prevail on the question of constitutionality, but wrote that the State of Georgia was required to conduct “additional diligent and reasonable efforts” to make people aware of the need of canceled voters to re-register, and that the plaintiffs could seek “emergency relief” utilizing a state court that was better suited to deal with the matter. Georgia is one of nine states with a law allowing voters to be removed from the list of registered voters for inactivity, under the latest statute anyone who has three years of voting inactivity followed by non-voting in two federal election cycles and then failing to respond to a notice mailed out by the secretary of state’s office being eligible for removal. However Republican Secretary of State for Georgia, Brad Raffensperger was purging voters years before the legal deadline set in the new legislation based on a prior statute. Lawyers for Fair Fight Action contested this purge, and Fair Fight's CEO Lauren Groh-Wargo argued, "Georgians should not lose their right to vote simply because they have not expressed that right in recent elections." Articles by ''The Atlanta Journal-Constitution'' added in context that Fair Fight Action has also been challenging other obstacles that have previously prevented Georgia voters from being able to vote including rejections of absentee ballots, long lines at the polls, and precinct closures that have disproportionately harmed the ability of African Americans to vote in prior years, which could have prevented voters from voting previously and resulted in their placement on the inactive voters list. The list of past voters that Jones did not enjoin from being purged does not have any included data regarding racial disparities among the affected voters. On January 2, 2024, Jones ruled that right-wing group True the Vote's challenging of 364,000 voter registrations did not amount to "voter intimidation".Personal life
Jones is married to Lillian Kincey, a teacher.See also
* List of African-American federal judges * List of African-American juristsReferences
External links
* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Jones, Steve C. 1957 births Living people African-American judges Georgia (U.S. state) state court judges Judges of the United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia People from Athens, Georgia United States district court judges appointed by Barack Obama Terry College of Business alumni 21st-century African-American lawyers