Jackson will be sworn in on Thursday as Breyer steps down

SCOTUS NEWS

Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson will be sworn in as the newest Supreme Court justice at noon on Thursday, June 30. She will become the first Black woman ever to serve on the court.

Jackson will replace Justice Stephen Breyer, who announced Wednesday in a letter to President Joe Biden that he will make his retirement official and step down on Thursday. The 83-year-old Breyer announced in January that he would retire when the Supreme Court begins its summer recess. With the court poised to issue its final two decisions on Thursday at 10 a.m., Breyer wrote, his retirement “will be effective on Thursday, June 30, 2022, at noon.”

In a month in which Breyer dissented in several blockbuster cases – overturning the constitutional right to an abortion, expanding the scope of the Second Amendment, and upholding an increased role for religion in public life — he added that it had been his “great honor to participate as a judge in the effort to maintain our Constitution and the Rule of Law.”

In April, the Senate confirmed Jackson, a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, to succeed Breyer.

Supreme Court justices take two oaths of office. Chief Justice John Roberts will administer the “constitutional oath” to Jackson, and Breyer will administer the “judicial oath,” the court said. The swearing-in ceremony will be livestreamed at www.supremecourt.gov.

This article was originally published at Howe on the Court.