Hon. Rainey Ransom Brandt was appointed as Magistrate Judge, Superior Court of the District of Columbia, in 2012, and currently presides as team leader on a misdemeanor traffic trial calendar in the Criminal Division. With a Ph.D. from American University (1993) and a JD from the Columbus School of Law at the Catholic University of America (1995), she began working at Superior Court in 1996, as a law clerk to Judge Michael Rankin and later Judge Stephanie Duncan­Peters. In 1998, Judge Brandt became Special Counsel to the Chief Judge and served the last three chief judges. In addition to being counsel to the chief judges, she served as ombudsman to the justice community for prisoner/correctional issues. As Special Counsel, she held leadership roles on various committees that focused on improving access to the administration of justice, as well as providing judicial training sessions for new and seasoned judges. Judge Brandt continues to serve on several judicial committees within the Court, and provides mentorship to young lawyers. 

In May 2015, Judge Brandt received the Distinguished Alumnus Award from the DC Law Students in Court legal clinic. In 2010, Judge Brandt received the Council for Court Excellence's Justice Potter Stewart Award in recognition of her work on behalf of the administration of justice. 

Prior to her work at the Court, Judge Brandt was a full-time professor in the Department of Justice, Law and Criminology at American University, where she remains an adjunct associate professor.