The justice’s retirement gives President Biden the opportunity to nominate a replacement ahead of this fall’s elections.
Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer ‘s impending retirement will keep the Court in the public conversation heading into the midterm election season but likely won’t have as big an impact on voters as a decision on Roe v. Wade. Breyer, one of the Court’s more liberal justices, officially announced his retirement at the White House on Thursday. His departure at the end of the term provides President Joe Biden with the opportunity to put forth his nominee before Democrats face the possibility of losing their narrow majorities in both chambers of Congress. On Thursday, Biden described the task of nominating a justice to the Court as “one of the most serious constitutional responsibilities a president has.” But political science experts say that while Biden’s nominee will likely be historic—the president has vowed to place the first Black woman on the Court—that choice won’t shift its political balance. “Biden’s replacement of Breyer will have minimal immediate short-term impact on the Court,” Thomas Keck, a political science professor at Syracuse University’s Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs, told Newsweek. “There will still be a 6-3 conservative majority.” Biden’s opportunity to nominate an associate justice comes after former President Donald Trump placed three conservative justices on the bench. E.J. Fagan, an assistant professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago’s Department of Political Science, pointed to the justices’ ages—Breyer is the oldest at 83, with Associate Justice Clarence Thomas 10 years behind him and Associate Justice Amy Coney Barrett the youngest at 50.
