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President Donald Trump has released an additional 20 names he would select from if any Supreme Court vacancies arise during his remaining time in office, including the president's rival-turned-Senate ally, Ted Cruz. The list also includes Sens. Tom Cotton and Josh Hawley as well as two former solicitors general.

The president's running list, which he first compiled in 2016, already included more than a dozen conservative legal minds from across the country. With Wednesday's additions, he adds bulk to the number of justices he would choose from to bolster the court's conservative majority. 

"Over the next four years, the next president will choose hundreds of federal judges and one, two, three, four Supreme Court justices," Trump said during a Wednesday press conference at the White House before laying out what he called a bleak picture of possible realities if "radical left judges" were nominated under Democratic rival Joe Biden.

Trump's updated list, which includes several women and people of color, reflects the emphasis the Republican Party has to pay in its attempt to 

 more broadly outside of white, often older, reliably conservative circles. 

The Wednesday list includes Daniel Cameron, the Black, conservative 

 who has faced widespread criticism this year for his handling of the police shooting death of Breonna Taylor, which sparked nationwide protests against police brutality.

Supreme Court nominations are among the most consequential and long-lasting decisions a president can make. Justices to the highest court in the land have a lifetime appointment and are the final say in controversial decisions such as abortion rights, same-sex marriage and civilian gun ownership. 

In a tweet following Trump's announcement, Hawley, one of a handful of sitting U.S. senators the president said he would choose from if the time came, declined the president's endorsement to the court. 

"I appreciate the President's confidence in listing me as a potential Supreme Court nominee. But as I told the President, Missourians elected me to fight for them in the Senate, and I have no interest in the high court. I look forward to confirming constitutional conservatives," Hawley 

The full list of Trump's additional picks is as follows: 

 of Arizona, judge of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals

 of Kentucky, that state's attorney general

 of Virginia, former U.S. solicitor general 

 of Louisiana, judge on the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals 

 of the District of Columbia, assistant attorney general for the Office of Legal Counsel at the Department of Justice

 of Virginia, judge on the District of Columbia Circuit Court of Appeals

, a judge from Florida on the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals

 of Maryland, United States Ambassador to Mexico

 of Florida, justice on the Supreme Court of Florida

 of Illinois, judge on the District Court for the Northern District of Illinois

 of Pennsylvania, judge on the Third Circuit Court of Appeals

 of Missouri, judge on the District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri

 of North Carolina, judge on the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals

 of Virginia, deputy assistant to the president and deputy counsel to the president

 of Nevada, judge on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.  

Politics and Government News

Election 2020

Alana Wise

Author

Trump on Wednesday released an additional 20 names he said he would select from if any Supreme Court vacancies arise during his remaining time in office. 

Trump adds Ted Cruz, Tom Cotton, to list of potential SCOTUS picks

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