Durbin says frontrunner picks for Supreme Court vacancy ‘unfair to all the nominees’

Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee, said on Sunday that to suggest there is a front runner to fill the upcoming vacancy on the Supreme Court is “unfair.”

“I sure don’t want to speculate on that,” Durbin said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” when asked specifically about Ketanji Brown Jackson, a D.C. Circuit judge who has been before the committee. 

“I think suggesting there’s a front runner or this person is now moving ahead, that’s unfair to all the nominees. This is in the hands of the president as it should be,” he added.

“If there are no new developments for someone who’s been before the committee in the previous year or two, it makes a real difference,” Durbin also said, adding that the process is “going to be fair, it’s going to be deliberate and we’re going to be timely.”

Last week, President Biden reinforced his intentions to nominate a Black woman to the Supreme Court following Justice Stephen Breyer’s announcement that he would retire after 27 years on the high court. 

“I’ve made no decision except one: The person I will nominate will be someone with extraordinary qualifications, character experience and integrity,” Biden said. “And that person will be the first Black woman ever nominated to the United States Supreme Court. It’s long overdue in my view. I made that commitment during my campaign for president, and I will keep that commitment.”

On Friday, the White House also confirmed that J. Michelle Childs, a federal district judge in South Carolina, is “among multiple individuals under consideration for the Supreme Court.”