Donald Trump’s Reported Supreme Court Nominee is Reportedly Amy Coney Barrett

Despite the fact that Republicans previously blocked President Barack Obama’s nomination to the Supreme Court in 2016 because it was an election year, they encourage President Donald Trump to move forward with naming a replacement nominee for late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. According to CNN, Trump plans to nominate Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court. Barrett is a federal appellate judge and a law professor at Notre Dame University.

Multiple sources have said that Barrett is Trump’s intended nominee to fill the vacancy left by Ginsburg after her passing. Although, they did caution that until an announcement is made, this could all change at the last moment. Barrett was reportedly at the White House on Monday and Tuesday and was said to have impressed the president and others during their initial meetings. The law professor previously served as a law clerk to right-wing Justice Antonin Scalia, who died in 2016. If the Senate successfully confirms her, she would become Trump’s third Supreme Court pick in one presidential term, ensuring a conservative stronghold for years to come.

One source said that the “machinery is in motion” regarding Trump’s nomination of Barrett. A former senior administration official who is familiar with this process even said, “She was the plan all along. She’s the most distinguished and qualified by traditional measures. She has the strongest support among the legal conservatives who have dedicated their lives to the court. She will contribute most to the court’s jurisprudence in the years and decades to come.” This news comes a week after Justice Ginsburg died. Chief Justice John Roberts announced the news via a statement that read, “Our nation has lost a justice of historic stature. We at the Supreme Court have lost a cherished colleague. Today we mourn but with confidence that future generations will remember Ruth Bader Ginsburg as we knew her, a tired and resolute champion of justice.”

Back in 2016, months before the presidential election was to take place, Justice Scalia died. To fill the vacancy, President Obama nominated Merrick Garland for the position. At the time, Republicans refused to advance Garland’s nomination because it was an election year. They claimed that they wanted the Americans to decide the next president before any Supreme Court decisions were made. But, now, less than two months away from the next presidential election, the Republicans have changed their tune and are encouraging Trump to move forward with his pick despite the very precedent that they set four years prior.