Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer reportedly plans to announce his retirement as early as this week. The 83-year-old justice, who tends to side with the liberals on the bench, has faced pressure from Democrats to hang up his robe sooner rather than later so that the party can confirm a Biden nominee.

Breyer’s exit gives President Joe Biden, who has promised to nominate a Black woman, his first opportunity to replace a judge on the nation’s most important court.

• With Breyer’s departure, the Court loses its resident pragmatist. The justice often worked behind the scenes to secure compromises between his liberal and conservative colleagues, the law professor Jeffrey Rosen explains: “The high unanimity rate and unusual ideological alliances last term are a tribute to the ultimate persuasiveness of his nonpartisan vision.”
• The early front-runner for Breyer’s seat is … Ketanji Brown Jackson, a former federal public defender who currently sits on the country’s second-most important court. Jackson’s appointment “would signal a new era and a shift away from the decades-long default to former prosecutors and corporate lawyers,” Brian Fallon, the executive director of Demand Justice, told Elaine Godfrey.