US President Donald Trump plans to elect a candidate next week to replace the late Chief Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg (87) as a member of the Supreme Court, he reports at a campaign meeting on Saturday. The president says he will appoint a woman.
“It will be a woman. I think it must be a woman because I actually like women a lot more than men,” said the president.
Trump has named Amy Coney Barrett and Barbara Lagoa, two conservative female judges, as possible candidates. Trump also previously named Allison Jones Rushing as a possible candidate.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a progressive chief justice, died on Friday from pancreatic cancer. With her death, a new place has become available in the US Supreme Court. For Republicans, it is an opportunity to expand the conservative majority (5-4).
The US Supreme Court is the most important legal body in the US and consists of nine sitting judges who are appointed for life. Ginsburg is the third judge to replace Trump since his appointment in 2017.
Democrats are calling for a postponement
However, the Democrats are calling to hold off on appointing a new judge until after the US presidential election on November 3. Some Republican senators are also calling for waiting.
In 2016, Republicans did the same by blocking then-President Barack Obama’s appointment of progressive Judge Merrick Garland. They felt that in the last year of his term, a president should not appoint a new judge to such an important post.
However, Mitch McConnell, Leader of the Republicans in the US Senate, said on Friday that he wanted to hold a vote on the replacement of Ginsburg as soon as possible.
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