WASHINGTON (Fwrd Axis) — President Joe Biden is considering Judge J. Michelle Childs to fill the upcoming vacancy on the Supreme Court when Justice Stephen Breyer retires later this year, the White House confirmed on Friday night.
Childs is a judge on the U.S. district court in South Carolina and is the first person to be publicly identified as a possible nominee by the Biden administration. Biden also nominated Childs for a seat on the D.C. Circuit.
“Judge Childs is among multiple individuals under consideration for the Supreme Court, and we are not going to move her nomination on the Court of Appeals while the President is considering her for this vacancy,” White House spokesman Andrew Bates said in a statement.
The Washington Post was the first to report the news of Biden was considering Childs.
House Majority Whip James Clyburn has been pushing for Childs to get the job. Clyburn is a long-time Biden ally who played a key role in getting the President to vow he’d name a Black woman to the Supreme Court on the campaign trail.
Childs was scheduled to meet with the Senate Judiciary Committee next week for a confirmation hearing on her nomination to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. However, the White House has put that on hold while she’s under consideration for the Supreme Court.
Other names being considered include Ketanji Brown Jackson and California Supreme Court Justice Leondra Kruger.
In his statement Friday, Bates said that any “reporting indicating that the President is only seriously considering three potential nominees is incorrect.”
Breyer, 83, is the oldest member of the court and was nominated by former President Bill Clinton back in 1994. He is of three remaining liberal justices and if confirmed, Biden’s nomination would allow the court to remain 6-3 in favor of the conservatives.
