CNN legal analyst suggested Vice President Kamala Harris could be nominated to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Attorney Bakari Sellers, who was a Democratic member of the South Carolina House of Representatives for eight years, said that 70-year-old liberal Justice Sonia Sotomayor could retire from the Supreme Court, allowing President Joe Biden to nominate Harris.
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Harris was San Francisco district attorney and California attorney general before being elected senator, and then vice president. While electing an attorney with no judicial experience to the court is unusual, it is not unprecedented.
President Barack Obama nominated Elena Kagan as a Supreme Court justice, even though she had never been a judge. Chief Justice John Roberts served for two years on the Washington, D.C., appeals court before he was nominated.
When four party-aligned independents are considered, Democrats currently have a 51-49 majority in the Senate, which votes by simple majority on presidential nominations to the Supreme Court.
Republicans just won a Senate majority in the November 5 elections, but the new senators will not take their seats until January, allowing Biden a narrow window to nominate a Supreme Court justice if Sotomayor agrees to retire.
Sotomayor’s Health of Growing Concern
Speaking to CNN’s John Berman, Sellers suggested that putting Harris on the Supreme Court would give the vice president a new role after she was defeated by President-elect Donald Trump while guaranteeing a long-term liberal seat.
He suggested it could be rushed through before Trump takes the presidency.
“I think that’s actually a very good plan. I think it’s something that should happen,” he said.
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“You know, Justice Sotomayor has been a more than able justice. I know that she may be having some personal issues that she contends with while serving on the bench. But, you know, I don’t want Justice Sotomayor to be another Ruth Bader Ginsburg in terms of staying too long.”
Justice Ginsburg, 89, died in the final months of the Trump presidency, allowing him to nominate Amy Coney Barrett to replace her, moving the Supreme Court to a 6-3 conservative majority.
Sellers said that if Sotomayor were to resign now, it would ensure that a liberal would replace her.
“The court is 6-3 now….The possibility of Justice Sotomayor having to resign or retire in the next four years is extremely high,” he said. “You have a hell of a vice president right there who has a legal pedigree to sit on a Supreme Court. And let Republicans go crazy, ape, I’m even mentioning that option.
Not only am I floating it, but I want to stir up everything. I want people’s heads to explode this morning.”
Sellers said he hoped that Biden “makes the next 10 weeks as consequential as he can.
“I don’t care about drawing outside the lines or what Republicans may think about it. This is within your [Biden’s] purview. You can actually do it and you should do it.”
Sotomayor is 70 and has type 1 diabetes. While there are conservative justices older than her on the Supreme Court (Clarence Thomas, 76, and Samuel Alito, 74), her health has led to some Democrats calling for her to step down. Long-term diabetes can lead to complications like cardiovascular disease, kidney disease, nerve damage and vision problems, which can be more pronounced in older adults.
On election night, Miranda Yaver, an assistant professor of health policy and management at the University of Pittsburgh, posted on X, formerly Twitter, “Sotomayor should retire tomorrow and let the lame-duck Senate confirm her replacement.”
David Dayen, editor of The American Prospect, echoed the sentiment, writing on Wednesday: “This would probably be a good day for Sotomayor to retire.”
Maria Town, president of the nonpartisan American Association of People with Disabilities, in April called the concerns “ableism, pure and simple.”
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Mia Ives-Rublee, director for the Disability Justice Initiative at the left-leaning Center for American Progress, also spoke out against calls for Sotomayor to step down earlier this year.
“I trust that, like all disabled people, she knows best about her body. Bodily autonomy is not just about reproductive rights. It’s about allowing people, including disabled people, to choose how they want to live their lives,” she said.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre previously said that Biden would not call on Sotomayor to resign.
“When it comes to those types of decisions, those are personal decisions, regardless of if it’s Justice Sotomayor or any other justice on the bench,” she said.
Newsweek reached out to the Harris presidential campaign and Sotomayor’s office via email for comment.
Could Harris Be Appointed to Supreme Court?
Republican strategist Shermichael Singleton, who has worked on three presidential election campaigns, told Berman that Republican Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell would try to fight Harris’ nomination.
“Best of luck getting around Mitch McConnell, who is arguably one of the most surgical individuals to ever lead or be in the minority position of the United States Senate,” he said.
“I think if Democrats were to attempt to nominate the vice president or anybody else, I think Mitch is going to do everything he can within the confines of the Senate rules to prohibit it, to give the incoming president the opportunity to make every single nomination and ultimately confirm those nominations that he can,” he said.
The pro-Democratic Party account Protect Kamala Harris received more than 143,000 likes for its November 7 post on X, formerly Twitter, suggesting that Biden could nominate Harris to the Supreme Court if Sotomayor resigned.
“Want to blow Republicans’ minds? Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor retires. President Biden appoints Kamala Harris to Sotomayor’s vacancy with a lame duck Democratic senate majority. Supreme Court Justice Kamala Harris,” the post said.
