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A Ninth Circuit appeal is generally a long-term endeavor. The Court itself tells parties that the likely “time-to-argument”—i.e. the time between a filing a notice of appeal and the Court hearing oral argument—is between 12 and 20 months, and even that range may sometimes be optimistic. But in recent months, at least anecdotally, cases appear to be getting to oral argument more quickly than they have in the past.*
We wanted to put some numbers to this perceived trend. Long story short, it is real: in the last year and half, the median time-to-argument in the Ninth Circuit has decreased by nearly two months. The decline is even more dramatic among appeals in civil cases (a category that excludes criminal, prisoner, immigration, bankruptcy, tax, and agency appeals).