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President Joe Biden said that he is not aiming to "make an ideological choice" when choosing a Supreme Court nominee.
Since Justice Stephen Breyer plans to retire later this year, Biden has been presented with his first opportunity to nominate someone to serve on the nation's high court.
During an interview with Lester Holt of NBC News, the president said that he is seeking someone who has the "same kind of capacity" as Breyer — someone who interprets the U.S. Constitution in a manner which is in line with "mainstream interpretation," Biden noted.
He said he has "taken about four people," and performed a "deep dive" examining whether anything in their background would render them unqualified.
President Biden on his search for a Supreme Court nominee:\n\nBiden tells @LesterHoltNBC that he\u2019s done a deep dive on \u201cabout four people,\u201d and thinks his pick will get a vote from Republicans\n\nBiden says he's looking for someone "with the same kind of capacity" as Justice Breyerpic.twitter.com/pNYLrLVSBR— NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt (@NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt) 1644529431
The president has previously declared that he will abide by his campaign commitment to select a black woman as the nominee, a plan that has been praised by some and decried by others.
He has also previously said that "there's always a renewed national debate every time ... any president nominates a justice, because the Constitution is always evolving slightly in terms of additional rights or curtailing rights, et cetera." He noted that he is seeking an individual whose judicial philosophy indicates that the Constitution has "unenumerated rights" and that "all the amendments mean something, including the Ninth Amendment."
The Ninth Amendment states that, "The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people."
