Born and raised in Honolulu, Thomas Y.K. Fong has long loved learning about the earth’s natural processes. He originally planned to earn a bachelor’s degree in geology at BYU and then pursue graduate studies in oceanography. But during one midwinter geology field trip to St. George, Utah, a sandstorm blew through the group’s campsite, prompting Fong to reconsider whether his studies had brought him too close to nature for comfort. “Halfway through that cold, sand-blown night, I’m thinking, ‘Is this really what I want to do for the rest of my life?’” Fong recalls.
So Fong switched his major to business management with a finance emphasis. He had also joined the BYU Army ROTC, and in 1972 he graduated as the Superior Cadet and a Distinguished Military Graduate. He was immediately commissioned as an officer in the Adjutant General Corps for two years active duty and another four years reserve service during the Vietnam War era. “It was a good way to apply my managerial skills,” he says.
Fong decided a law degree would be a great complement to his business degree. He attended BYU’s J. Reuben Clark Law School, graduating in 1977. During a personal interview with Rex E. Lee, then dean of the law school, Fong says Lee “emphasized the possibility of government service for at least part of my legal career to serve both community and country and yet still have time for family and Church service.” Fong took Lee’s advice, and public service became the focus of his entire legal career.
He accepted a position under the US Attorney General’s Honors Program, serving for three years as a trial attorney, a short time as an appellate trial attorney in Virginia, and two years as the chief trial attorney and chief legal officer for the Central District of Los Angeles. In 1984 he was appointed a United States immigration judge (IJ), making him one of the first IJs of Asian or Polynesian ancestry since the position was created in 1952. Finally, in 2006, Fong was appointed as an assistant chief immigration judge, overseeing immigration courts in Utah, parts of California, and the entire US Pacific Ocean. “I found my business-management training extremely useful as a supervisory judge in managing the far-flung courts, dozens of judges, and a hundred staff who were thousands of miles away from my home-base court in Los Angeles,” he says.
Passionate about training future judges, Fong has taught as an adjunct professor of law at the National Judicial College at the University of Nevada, Reno, since 1997. In that position, and as part of the new IJ training course program, he covered subjects such as entering oral decisions from the bench and courtroom control. “The major part of teaching control was teaching judges to control themselves,” he explains. “You’ve got to show compassion and patience and be one step ahead of emotional situations and still exemplify what is described as ‘judicious’ behavior and how people should respectfully treat one another in court.”
In his legal career, Fong represented the federal government both as a trial attorney and later as a judge on three cases that ultimately went before the US Supreme Court. “And either my initial arguments as an attorney or rulings as a judge were reaffirmed in all three cases,” he says.
Since 2016, Fong has gone into senior judge (or semiretired) status. Because of the ever-increasing nationwide backlog in cases, he has been asked to work part-time, a common circumstance for former judges. “I’ve loved being a government lawyer and judge,” he says. “What I enjoyed most about my career has been my opportunity to serve and help people.”
Fong also enjoys spending time on geology-related hobbies and with his family. He and his wife, Sharon Ann Wroten, have three children and ten grandchildren and live in Los Angeles.
