WASHINGTON — Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg says she doesn’t want to think about the possibility of Donald Trump winning the White House, and she predicts the next president — “whoever she will be” — will have a few appointments to make to the Supreme Court.
In an interview Thursday in her court office, the 83-year-old justice and leader of the court’s liberal wing said she presumes Democrat Hillary Clinton will be the next president. Asked what if Republican Donald Trump won instead, she said, “I don’t want to think about that possibility, but if it should be, then everything is up for grabs.”
That includes the future of the high court itself, on which she is the oldest justice. Two justices, Anthony Kennedy and Stephen Breyer, are in their late 70s.
“It’s likely that the next president, whoever she will be, will have a few appointments to make,” Ginsburg said, smiling.
She didn’t sound as though she is preparing to step down soon and shows no signs of slowing down. Ginsburg said she has been catching up on sleep since the court finished its work last week before a busy summer of travel that will take her to Europe and, as is her custom, to see as much opera as she can fit in.
In the wide-ranging interview, Ginsburg reviewed the just-ended term during which she lost her best friend on the court and, partly as a result, was on the winning side of most of the high-profile cases. Justice Antonin Scalia died in February, depriving his conservative allies of a reliable vote and leaving eight justices to decide nearly five dozen cases.
President Barack Obama has nominated Judge Merrick Garland for the ninth seat, but Senate Republicans have refused to hold a hearing or vote on Garland’s nomination, arguing the next president should have the right to name Scalia’s replacement. Even if the Senate were to confirm Garland after the election, the court probably would hear three months of cases without him, Ginsburg said.
And if there’s no action in a postelection, lame-duck session of Congress, the vacancy could last the entire term, she said.
She said court majorities this term moved to shut down tactics used by opponents of abortion and of affirmative action in higher education in two major cases.