Loretta Rush

BA, History, 1980

Loretta H. Rush took the oath of office as Indiana's 108th Supreme Court Justice in November 2012 after being appointed by Governor Mitch Daniels. She was retained by voters in 2014 and 2024. The Judicial Nominating Commission named her Indiana’s first female Chief Justice in August 2014, and she was reappointed in 2019 and 2024.

Chief Justice Rush is the Past-President of the Conference of Chief Justices and member of the National Center for State Courts Board of Directors. She also served as co-chair of the National Judicial Opioid Task Force and as an executive committee member on the National Judicial Task Force to Examine State Courts’ Response to Mental Illness. In 2019, she was appointed by Chief Justice John Roberts to the Judicial Conference Committee on Federal-State Jurisdiction. And Chief Justice Rush was elected as a member of the American Law Institute. In addition to being a member of local, state, and national bar associations, Chief Justice Rush is a Life Fellow of the American Bar Foundation and an Academy of Law Alumni Fellow for the Maurer School of Law. She is a former member of the Indiana Girl Advisory Council. She also chairs or is a member of several commissions, including the Indiana Judicial Conference Board of Directors and the Indiana Judicial Nominating/Qualifications Commission.

Prior to her appointment, Rush spent 15 years at a Lafayette law firm and was elected three times to serve as Tippecanoe Superior Court 3 judge. She was born in Pennsylvania and moved frequently as a child before settling in Indiana in 1972. She earned her undergraduate degree from Purdue University and her law degree from Indiana University Maurer School of Law, both with honors.