*WASHINGTON (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 23rd September, 2020) US President Donald Trump will announce his pick for a Supreme Court judge on Saturday at 5:00 p.m. EST (9:00 p.m. GMT), the White House said in a notice, affirming the controversial move to replace the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg weeks ahead of the country's election.
"President Donald J. Trump's Announcement of the Nominee for Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States (scheduled on) Saturday, September 26, 2020," the White House said in a one-page notice issued Wednesday.
The 87-year-old Ginsburg, one of the nine judges on the Supreme Court and a liberal supported by Trump's Democrat rivals, died on September 18 of complications from metastatic pancreatic cancer. Before her passing, the court was already stacked with a 5-4 conservative majority.
The move by Trump and his Republican to rush and fill her seat six weeks before the November 3 presidential election is being hotly contested by Democrats who argue that President Barack Obama was being prevented from doing the same when another Supreme Court judge, Antonin Scalia died in 2016 before that year's presidential election. Trump, who won that race, now faces Obama's former vice president Joe Biden, a Democrat who's leading in the polls for the upcoming election.
On Tuesday, Trump told reporters all nine seats on the Supreme Court must be filled before the election to prevent the mail-in ballot "scam." Trump has repeatedly claimed that mail-in ballots will lead to widespread vote fraud. Many believe more Democrats are likely use the mail-in ballot option, as opposed to voting in person, over COVID-19 concerns.
