Biden weighing more than a dozen candidates for Supreme Court vacancy

Washington — President Biden is contemplating greater than a dozen candidates to succeed retiring Justice Stephen Breyer on the Supreme Court docket, a supply conversant in the method advised CBS Information, with a pool of potential nominees that ranges from the federal bench to academia.

The White House confirmed final week that U.S. District Choose Michelle Childs is among the many ladies Mr. Biden is weighing as his nominee to the excessive court docket. Choose Ketanji Brown Jackson, who sits on the federal appeals court docket within the District of Columbia, and California Supreme Court docket Justice Leondra Kruger are additionally among the many names floated to fill the forthcoming emptiness.

Whereas the record isn’t exhaustive, the supply stated the three are joined as potential candidates by:

• Choose Holly Thomas of the ninth Circuit

• Choose Tiffany Cunningham of the Federal Circuit

• Choose Candace Jackson-Akiwumi of the seventh Circuit

• Choose Eunice Lee of the 2nd Circuit

• Choose Wilhelmina Wright of the federal district court docket in Minnesota

• Nancy Abudu, Mr. Biden’s nominee to the eleventh Circuit

• Arianna Freeman, Mr. Biden’s nominee to the third Circuit

• North Carolina Supreme Court docket Justice Anita Earls

• Sherrilyn Ifill, president and director-counsel of the NAACP Authorized Protection Fund

• Melissa Murray, New York College regulation professor

Breyer introduced final week he can be retiring from the Supreme Court on the finish of its present time period assuming a successor has been confirmed. The senior member of the court docket’s liberal bloc, Breyer, appointed in 1994, was the main target of an intense strain marketing campaign from progressive teams pushing him to step down and permit Mr. Biden to fill his seat whereas Democrats narrowly management the Senate.

Breyer’s retirement positions the president to make historical past along with his nominee, as Mr. Biden reiterated final week he’ll stick to his campaign pledge to call the primary Black girl to the Supreme Court docket. The president intends to announce his nominee earlier than the top of February, he stated.

A number of of the candidates stated to be into account have been appointed or nominated to the federal circuit courts by Mr. Biden, and Ifill served on the president’s fee on the Supreme Court docket, which examined proposals for reforming the excessive court docket.

The president tapped Jackson, thought-about a frontrunner, for the U.S. Court docket of Appeals for the District of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit final yr, whereas Childs has in her nook a strong supporter in Democratic Congressman Jim Clyburn of South Carolina.

Clyburn, the Home majority whip, was the architect behind Mr. Biden’s promise to appoint the primary Black girl to the Supreme Court docket, and his endorsement of then-candidate Biden in 2020 marked a turning level within the Democratic presidential primaries. 

South Carolina Lindsey Graham, a Republican, additionally praised Childs on Sunday, telling “Face the Nation” that he “cannot consider a greater particular person for President Biden to contemplate to the Supreme Court docket than Michelle Childs.”

Graham was among the many three Republicans — together with Senators Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska — who voted to substantiate Jackson and Jackson-Akiwumi to the D.C. Circuit and seventh Circuit, respectively. A variety of GOP senators additionally backed Cunningham to the U.S. Court docket of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, which hears patent appeals and sure civil instances.

Weijia Jiang contributed to this report.