Several judges are already being mentioned as potential U.S. Supreme Court justices in the new Trump administration.
Two of the most conservative Supreme Court justices, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito, may face calls to step down to allow younger conservative judges to take over during the second Trump presidency.
"Thomas is 76 and Alito is 74," New York University law professor Stephen Gillers told Newsweek. "If Trump wins and Republicans control the Senate, there will be great pressure on Thomas and Alito to retire in the next two years so they can be replaced with nominees in their 40s, who can serve for 30-40 more years."
In September, New York University law professor Stephen Choi and University of Virginia law professor Mitu Gulati released an in-depth study into the productivity and influence of federal judges. Trump appointees took nine out of the top 10 spots for productivity.
"Among those mentioned in [media] discussions of possible names for a Trump's short list, three come up frequently: Lawrence VanDyke, James Ho and Stuart Kyle Duncan," they noted.
Here is a profile of the three potential Supreme Court judges:
James Ho
"James Ho stands out in terms of both being on more short lists and appearing to go out of his way to court public attention," Choi and Gulati wrote. "Since being on the federal bench, he has written a series of controversial dissents and concurrences on hot-button topics such as: abortion, religion and gun rights. Writing dissents and concurrences is a rare thing for busy federal appeals court judges."
Ho was born in Taipei, Taiwan, in 1973 and having a Taiwanese American on the Supreme Court could be a powerful statement of support for the island in the face of Chinese aggression.
Ho is a member of the highly conservative Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in Texas and lives in Dallas with his wife, Allyson, and their twin daughter and son.
Trump nominated him in 2017 and he took his place on the federal bench in January 2018.
Previously, he was a law clerk for Thomas. He was a partner and co-chair of the national appellate and constitutional law practice group of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP, so he is well grounded in the constitutional arguments.
According to a profile on the website of the conservative Federalist Society, "he won numerous appeals, including three merits cases at the U.S. Supreme Court."
He was Texas state solicitor general and is "the only solicitor general in history to be invited by the U.S. Supreme Court to express the views of a state," the Federalist Society said.
He has also worked as an adjunct professor of law at the University of Texas School of Law.
Lawrence VanDyke
VanDyke lives with his wife, Cheryl, and three children in Reno, Nevada, and is a member of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.
He came into law through a highly unusual route. His family background is in engineering and he studied engineering and theology in college. When he went to work in the family's engineering company, he found there were many contract disputes, which led him to talk with attorneys and develop an interest in the law.
In a podcast interview for the Troutman Pepper law firm, he said: "I grew up in Montana and my dad had an irrigation and construction company in Montana, and so when I went to college, I just took engineering."
In the family firm, "we had disputes as almost every construction company does, and so I would work with lawyers in our disputes," he said.
He went on to earn a law degree from Harvard Law School, where he was an editor of the Harvard Law Review.
Prior to his appointment to the federal bench in January 2020, he served as a deputy assistant attorney general in the Environment and Natural Resources Division of the U.S. Department of Justice.
Before that, he served consecutively as the solicitor general of two states, Nevada and Montana.
Stuart Kyle Duncan
Duncan is another member of the highly conservative Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals.
At 52, he could be in line to serve on the Supreme Court for 20 years or more if nominated by Trump.
In private practice, he specialized in religious freedom and was the lead counsel in the Hobby Lobby Supreme Court case, which established that firms do not have to provide contraceptive coverage to employees if it violates the firm's religious ethos.
He received his B.A. from Louisiana State University in 1994 and his J.D. from Louisiana State University in 1997.
After graduating from law school, he clerked for Louisiana-based Fifth Circuit Judge John Malcolm Duhé Jr.
From 2004 to 2008, he was an assistant professor of law at the University of Mississippi School of Law.
Trump nominated him to the Fifth Circuit on May 1, 2018.
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