Who is on Biden’s shortlist to replace retiring Justice Breyer?

With Justice Stephen Breyer’s reported retirement opening a seat on the Supreme Court, President Joe Biden has a chance to fulfill a campaign promise to name a Black woman to the Court for the first time.

Only two African Americans, Justices Thurgood Marshall and Clarence Thomas, have served on the nation’s highest court, and only one woman of color has been a justice — Justice Sonia Sotomayor, who is Latina. And Black women aren’t just unrepresented on the Supreme Court, they are also massively underrepresented on the federal bench. And they were even more so before Biden took office.

Nearly all recent justices previously served on a federal appeals court before getting promoted to the high court. Of the nine current justices, only Justice Elena Kagan did not. But, when Biden took office, only five of the nearly 300 sitting federal appellate judges were Black women, according to the Federal Judicial Center. Biden has doubled that number, placing five more Black women on the federal appellate bench.