Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito reportedly has no immediate plans to retire as conservative concerns mount over the future of the nation’s highest court following a bruising midterm wipeout that could keep Republicans out of power for years.
Tuesday’s results saw Republicans lose at least seven seats across the country, giving Democrats a larger-than-expected Senate majority. The races in Mississippi and Alaska remain too close to call.
Vice President JD Vance warned Wednesday that the heavy losses could leave the GOP shut out of Senate control until at least 2032.
“The reason we lost is the war. The president himself said so last night,” Vance said. “If you’d like to argue it was worth it, that losing the Senate for the next six years was worth it, then do so. Argue it was a worthwhile cost to pay. Agree or disagree, that’s at least honest.”
“But everyone knows why we lost. And any honest conversation about where we go from here must start there,” he added.
A Democrat-controlled Senate could prevent President Donald Trump from securing confirmation of another conservative Supreme Court nominee. Alito, Chief Justice John Roberts, Justice Clarence Thomas, are all in their 70s, making the timing of any potential retirement consequential for the court’s ideological balance.
Speculation about Alito’s future has circulated for months and Tuesday’s results threw the high court back into the spotlight. However, according to The New York Times, which spoke with people close to the justice, he has no plans to step down immediately. It’s a position he’s repeated both publicly and privately.
“I intend to stick around through this term,” Alito previously told Bloomberg News.
But in October, the 76-year-old alluded that stepping down from the bench is now an annual consideration. In an interview with CBS News chief legal correspondent Jan Crawford, Alito said he had weighed stepping down this year but chose to remain on the bench despite what Crawford characterized as “pretty intense pressure” from GOP officials eager to confirm a like-minded successor.
“I thought that I could still make a valuable contribution,” Alito said, explaining his decision to stay on the court. “It’s too hard to predict what the political situation will be, and what any president might do with respect to a replacement.”
But he also made clear that his tenure could be coming to a close. “It’s something I think that somebody at my age has to think about every term,” he said.
When Crawford asked whether the conservative jurist would reconsider retirement each year, Alito replied, “Yeah, I think I have to.”
The possibility of a 2027 vacancy highlights the stakes of the November 2026 elections. It’s unclear where the Democrat-controlled Senate would even consider a nominee from the White House. Some believe the party would likely employ the same tactics Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) used to block Merrick Garland, who was President Barack Obama’s nominee after Justice Antonin Scalia died.
“Just think what this means, having 56 [Democrat] Senators. That means no Supreme Court justice will be confirmed under President Trump’s administration unless something happens in the next six weeks,” Florida Republican Governor Ron DeSantis warned. “No major cabinet officials that have strong conservative credentials are going to be able to be confirmed.”
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