Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., on Sunday defended the retention of Judge Sonia Sotomayor on the Supreme Court after some Democrats reportedly considered pressuring her to resign while President Joe Biden is still in office.
“No,” Sanders said, when asked by “Meet the Press” moderator Kristen Welker whether he thinks the 70-year-old Sotomayor should resign from her position while Biden can nominate a liberal replacement.
He added that he has heard “a little bit” of talk from Democratic senators about asking Sotomayor, who has a lifetime appointment to the Supreme Court, to step aside.
“I don’t think it’s wise,” Sanders said, without elaborating on his position.
Since President-elect Donald Trump was projected to win the presidential election last week, there has been behind-the-scenes talk among Democrats about calling for Sotomayor to resign, though no elected Democrat has yet publicly called for the judge to resign.
The driving force behind such calls could be that Biden, a Democrat, is still president for the next two months and that the Senate has a Democratic majority that could confirm a liberal justice to replace Sotomayor.
Starting in January, Trump, a Republican, will control judicial nominations and is expected to have the support of a Republican majority in the Senate.
If Sotomayor were to die during Trump’s term, she would likely be replaced by a conservative justice, pushing the now 6-3 conservative court further to the right.
Democrats previously faced this scenario when Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg chose not to resign during the first half of President Barack Obama’s second term, a time when Democrats had a 55-seat Senate majority.
She died in September 2020 and Trump, then serving his first term, appointed conservative Justice Amy Coney Barrett to replace her, leading to the court’s current conservative makeup.
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
