President Joe Biden promised Black voters Wednesday that he would appoint progressives to the US Supreme Court if elected to a second term, suggesting he expects vacancies on the high court over the next four years.

“The next president, they’re going to be able to appoint a couple justices, and I’ll be damned — if in fact we’re able to change some of the justices when they retire and put in really progressive judges like we’ve always had, tell me that won’t change your life,” he said during a campaign rally in Philadelphia.

It was as explicit a warning as Biden could offer about the stakes of the upcoming election, and a clear reminder that some of the nine justices have entered their seventies.

Clarence Thomas is 75 and Samuel Alito is 74; both are conservative and appointed by Republican presidents. Sonia Sotomayor, a liberal who was nominated by President Barack Obama, turns 70 next month.

  • BarbecueCowboy@lemmy.world
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    6 months ago

    I don’t think it’s even just the red/blue state issue. I haven’t seen many in a prime voting demographic who care about this issue and the ones that do care are concerned in terms of wasting taxpayer money. The overlap between demographics who aren’t statistically likely to vote anyways and people who are concerned about this issue is looking like it may be pretty damning.

    • WanderingVentra@lemm.ee
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      6 months ago

      Ya, but he shouldn’t turn away the youth vote imo. They had bigger than normal turnout in 2020 and they mostly went to him. It was still a small percentage of what the youth vote could’ve been if they got off their ass, but I think it still matters. It seems a risky gambit to abandon them for more reliable voting blocks that are also more hustorically conservative, especially if it means supporting a genocide and geographically and diplomatically isolating the US against the world. I have a feeling if you give the youth reasons to come out, they will.

      I also feel like Gen Z is more political than past demographic, at least the ones I’ve talked to have been. But I might be all wrong here. Elections surprise even the pundits and analysts, so who could know after 2016.