Donald Trump's possible choices for the Supreme Court

Several justices are already being mentioned as potential U.S. Supreme Court justices in the new Trump administration.

Two of the Supreme Court's most conservative justices, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito, could face calls to resign to allow younger conservative justices to take over during the second Trump presidency.

“Thomas is 76 and Alito is 74,” said Stephen Gillers, a law professor at New York University Newsweek. “If Trump wins and Republicans control the Senate, there will be a lot of pressure on Thomas and Alito to retire in the next two years so that they can be replaced by candidates in their 40s who have another 30 to 40 years in the game can be in office.”

In September, New York University law professor Stephen Choi and University of Virginia law professor Mitu Gulati published a detailed study on the productivity and influence of federal judges. Trump appointees took nine of the top 10 spots for productivity.

“Among those mentioned in (media) discussions about possible names for Trump's shortlist, three appear frequently: Lawrence VanDyke, James Ho and Stuart Kyle Duncan,” they noted.

Here is a profile of the three potential Supreme Court justices:

James Ho

“James Ho stands out for both being on the shortlist and seemingly doing his best to capture the public’s attention,” Choi and Gulati wrote. “Since sitting on the federal bench, he has authored a number of controversial dissents and concurrences on current issues such as abortion, religion and gun rights. Writing dissents and dissents is a rarity for busy federal appeals judges.”

Ho was born in Taipei, Taiwan, in 1973, and the fact that a Taiwanese American sits on the Supreme Court could be a strong sign of support for the island in the face of Chinese aggression.

Ho is a member of the extremely 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.

He previously worked as a legal trainee for Thomas. He was a partner and co-chair of the national appellate and constitutional law practice group at Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP and is therefore well versed in constitutional arguments.

According to a profile on the conservative Federalist Society's website, he “won numerous appeals, including three merits cases before the U.S. Supreme Court.”

He served as attorney general for the state of Texas and is “the only attorney general in history to be invited by the U.S. Supreme Court to present the views of a state,” the Federalist Society said.

He also served as an adjunct professor of law at the University of Texas School of Law.

Lawrence VanDyke

VanDyke lives in Reno, Nevada, with his wife, Cheryl, and three children, and is a member of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.

He came to the law through a most unusual path. His family comes from engineering backgrounds and he studied engineering and theology in college. While working in the family engineering firm, he discovered that there were many contract disputes, which led him to talk to lawyers and develop an interest in law.

In a podcast interview for the law firm Troutman Pepper, he said, “I grew up in Montana and my dad had an irrigation and construction company in Montana, and when I went to college I just studied engineering.”

In the family business, “we had disputes like almost any construction company, and so I worked with lawyers on our disputes,” he said.

He then earned a law degree from Harvard Law School, where he was editor of the magazine Harvard Law Review.

Prior to his appointment as a federal judge in January 2020, he served as a deputy assistant attorney general in the U.S. Department of Justice's Environment and Natural Resources Division.

He previously served successively as attorney general for the states of Nevada and Montana.

Stuart Kyle Duncan

Duncan is another member of the extremely conservative Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals.

At 52, he could 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 attorney in the Hobby Lobby Supreme Court case, which ruled that companies do not have to provide contraceptives to their employees if they violate the company's religious ethos.

He received his BA from Louisiana State University in 1994 and his JD 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.