--- title: Supreme Court: Donald Trump Will Nominate Justice description: Donald Trump will nominate a justice to fill the vacant seat on the Supreme Court within two weeks of his inauguration on Jan. 20 canonical: https://time.com/4631607/donald-trump-supreme-court-justice-nominate-two-weeks/ author: Mahita Gajanan article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2017-01-11T17:26:18.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-02-23T02:40:17.991Z article:section: Politics og:title: Donald Trump Says He Will Nominate a Supreme Court Justice Within 2 Weeks of Inauguration og:description: The nomination will likely come in the second week of his presidency og:url: https://time.com/4631607/donald-trump-supreme-court-justice-nominate-two-weeks/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blta22e6f26ac5a60de/6988b529524fc03586dfab24/trump-presser-supreme-court.jpg?branch=production&width=2400&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 675 og:image:alt: President-Elect Donald Trump Holds Press Conference In New York og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Donald Trump Says He Will Nominate a Supreme Court Justice Within 2 Weeks of Inauguration twitter:description: The nomination will likely come in the second week of his presidency twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blta22e6f26ac5a60de/6988b529524fc03586dfab24/trump-presser-supreme-court.jpg?branch=production&width=2400&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Donald Trump Says He Will Nominate a Supreme Court Justice Within 2 Weeks of Inauguration by [Mahita Gajanan](https://time.com/author/mahita-gajanan/) ## Mahita Gajanan Gajanan is an editor at TIME. Jan 11, 2017 5:26 PM UTC  President-elect Donald Trump speaks at a news conference at Trump Tower on January 11, 2017 in New York City. President-elect Donald Trump speaks at a news conference at Trump Tower on January 11, 2017 in New York City.Spencer Platt—Getty Images by [Mahita Gajanan](https://time.com/author/mahita-gajanan/) ## Mahita Gajanan Gajanan is an editor at TIME. Jan 11, 2017 5:26 PM UTC [Donald Trump](http://time.com/4631597/donald-trump-business-separation/) expects to nominate a justice to fill the vacant seat on the Supreme Court within two weeks of his inauguration on Jan. 20, the President-elect said during a [news conference](http://time.com/4631349/donald-trump-news-conference-russia/?xid=homepage) on Wednesday. The nomination will likely come in the second week of his presidency, following inauguration celebrations, Trump said. The seat on the Supreme Court has been vacant since the [death of justice Antonin Scalia](http://time.com/4224348/scalia-vacancy-supreme-court/) in Feb. 2016\. Republican senators have refused to consider President Barack Obama’s [nomination of Chief Judge Merrick Garland](http://time.com/4527449/2016-election-supreme-court/) to the Supreme Court, saying they will wait until a new president takes office to do so. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4631607/donald-trump-supreme-court-justice-nominate-two-weeks/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4631607/donald-trump-supreme-court-justice-nominate-two-weeks/"},"headline":"Donald Trump Says He Will Nominate a Supreme Court Justice Within 2 Weeks of Inauguration","datePublished":"2017-01-11T17:26:18.000Z","dateModified":"2026-02-23T02:40:17.991Z","description":"The nomination will likely come in the second week of his presidency","url":"https://time.com/4631607/donald-trump-supreme-court-justice-nominate-two-weeks/","keywords":["Donald Trump","onetime"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blta22e6f26ac5a60de/6988b529524fc03586dfab24/trump-presser-supreme-court.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Mahita Gajanan","jobTitle":"Gajanan is an editor at TIME.","url":"https://time.com/author/mahita-gajanan/"}],"articleSection":"Politics","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blta22e6f26ac5a60de/6988b529524fc03586dfab24/trump-presser-supreme-court.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"President-Elect Donald Trump Holds Press Conference In New York","caption":"President-Elect Donald Trump Holds Press Conference In New York","creditText":"Spencer Platt—Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/politics/","name":"Politics"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/donald-trump/","name":"Donald Trump"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4631607/donald-trump-supreme-court-justice-nominate-two-weeks/","name":"Donald Trump Says He Will Nominate a Supreme Court Justice Within 2 Weeks of Inauguration"}}]}] ```