After Justice Anthony Kennedy told President Donald Trump he would relinquish his seat on the Supreme Court, the president emerged from his private meeting with the retiring jurist focused on one candidate to name as his successor: Judge Brett Kavanaugh, Kennedy’s former law clerk.

Trump, according to confidants and aides close to the White House, has become increasingly convinced that “the judges,” as he puts it, or his administration’s remaking of the federal judiciary in its conservative image, is central to his legacy as president. And he credits Kennedy, who spent more than a decade at the center of power on the court, for helping give him the opportunity.


So even as Trump dispatched his top lawyers to comb though Kavanaugh’s rulings and quizzed allies about whether he was too close to the Bush family, potentially a fatal flaw, the president was always leaning toward accepting Kennedy’s partiality for Kavanaugh while preserving the secret until his formal announcement, sources with knowledge of his thinking told POLITICO.

Trump, who spent more time with Kavanaugh than the other finalists, was impressed with the judge’s credentials, long judicial record and fidelity to the Constitution, according to administration officials. What was listed as a deal-breaker to some on the right — his long paper trail — was actually the thing that drew Trump to Kavanaugh.

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Administration officials said Trump was taken with Kavanaugh even before his conversation with Kennedy. But Kennedy, in leaving the impression with Trump that Kavanaugh would be a great candidate for the job, helped the president make up his mind.

Trump nonetheless helped stoke anticipation by interviewing a trio of other contenders, Judges Raymond Kethledge; Amy Coney Barrett, a favorite among anti-abortion groups; and Thomas Hardiman, the runner-up to Trump’s first pick for the high court, Neil Gorsuch, another Kennedy clerk.

Trump hit it off with Hardiman, aides said, and he views Barrett as a solid contender should he get a third Supreme Court nomination. Kethledge’s bid was scuttled by rulings that conservatives viewed as too accommodating to undocumented immigrants. By Friday, Trump had all but settled on Kavanaugh, a man with an Ivy League degree and conservative pedigree, according to two Republicans close to the White House. But he didn’t make his final decision until Sunday.

Late Monday, Trump made it official by selecting Kavanaugh for the high court. Standing next to Kavanaugh, his wife and two daughters, Trump made his remarks from the East Room of the White House, after thanking Kennedy for “a lifetime of distinguished service.”

“Judge Kavanaugh has impeccable credentials, unsurpassed qualifications and a proven commitment to equal justice under the law,” Trump said in his introduction of the Yale Law School graduate, who, he was careful to note, teaches at Harvard, Yale and Georgetown.

“Throughout legal circles he is considered a judge’s judge. A true thought leader among his peers, he is a brilliant jurist with a clear and effective writing style, universally regarded as one of the finest and sharpest legal minds of our time,” Trump added. “And just like Justice Gorsuch, he excelled as a clerk for Justice Kennedy.”

Kavanaugh, in his own speech, was effusive in his praise of Kennedy, telling how the jurist dedicated his career to securing liberty. “I am deeply honored to be nominated to fill his seat on the Supreme Court,” he told the room of family, friends and applauding Republican senators.

The White House declined to comment on Trump’s selection process, and a Supreme Court spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment about Trump’s meeting with Kennedy.

Those backing Kavanaugh viewed him as the safest choice, given his 12-year record on the bench and his own personal chemistry with the president, while Trump allies see him as more conservative than his mentor and the most confirmable of the group, particularly with Republican senators. “I think he knows his record was more conservative than Kennedy’s,” one Trump ally said of the president’s decision.

Trump remained coy throughout the search, offering little indication beyond pledging to choose from a pre-vetted list of 25 contenders who were blessed by conservative organizations and White House counsel Don McGahn, who also favored Kavanaugh. Trump interviewed Kavanaugh in the White House at least twice, with McGahn sitting in on the interviews.

Though many in Washington were unsurprised by the pick, the president worked hard to keep it a secret, offering few clues of his leanings in his many conversations with aides and close associates. He wanted to heighten the suspense of his big East Room reveal, which he modeled after his January 2017 announcement of Gorsuch’s nomination. Many in the White House still marvel that the Gorsuch news was largely kept under wraps until Trump made it public.

In the West Wing, the Supreme Court pick was celebrated not just for its rare lack of leaks, but also as proof that this White House can stick to a carefully orchestrated process, avoid infighting and — at least for now — unite large parts of the Republican Party.

Trump nonetheless offered small hints of his leanings. Last week, when quizzing friends about his possible picks, a Republican source said Trump shot back a quick defense of Kavanaugh when his name came up.

The White House was so pleased with the selection process for Gorsuch that it decided to follow the same playbook, only this time it narrowed the field initially to the four finalists. Only a tiny circle of White House senior aides, such as McGahn, and outside officials, such as the Federalist Society’s Leonard Leo, who is currently on leave from the conservative group, were clued into the judicial selection process.

“This is something held very close to the vest. It does go to show that when it comes to important decisions, if the right people are involved, the story does not leak out,” said one Republican close to the White House.

The White House took pains to keep the news from leaking. The president didn’t inform Kavanaugh of his decision until Sunday night, according to two administration officials, when he also told McGahn and Vice President Mike Pence, allowing little time for the news to spread around Washington.

The White House also gave the other potential candidates little information about where the president stood, asking all of the top contenders to provide lists of potential guests for Monday’s announcement, according to a person familiar with the planning. It also didn’t hurt that Hardiman was in Washington on Monday for a pre-scheduled conference.

Even lawmakers were told of the decision only right before the televised announcement. Standing beside Pence and first lady Melania Trump, the president informed senators during a reception in the State Dining Room before his 9 p.m. remarks. Kavanaugh joined lawmakers and other officials present for the ceremony for another reception after the event, according to two administration officials.

But the White House failed to completely hide Kavanaugh’s arrival at the White House. Two sources told POLITICO they spotted Kavanaugh entering the building at 5:30 p.m. — through the residence on the South Lawn, away from the watchful eyes of journalists.

People close to the White House were hesitant to make predictions about who Trump would pick, despite indications he was leaning toward Kavanaugh. Trump, they noted, is nothing if not unpredictable, and the White House has been known to take steps to throw reporters and Trump’s own backers off the scent.

Two people close to the White House said McGahn’s team fanned false rumors last year that both Hardiman and Gorsuch were being brought to Washington for a reality show-style reveal of Trump’s first Supreme Court pick. The rumors, which were bolstered when Hardiman was spotted at a gas station by a reporter, further ramped up the suspense of Trump’s announcement.

A handful of lawyers from the White House counsel’s office, along with aides from the communications and personnel offices, had huddled on the fourth floor of the Eisenhower Executive Office Building for days to review the writings and opinions of the leading candidates.

They continued sharpening the briefing and vetting materials over the weekend, knowing that Trump would likely wait until his self-imposed deadline of Monday to make his decision public. By Sunday, the White House signed off on briefing packets, which included key decisions and biographical material, for the top four candidates.

All along they described feeling keenly aware that the mercurial president would vacillate between judges as he polled his close friends and allies, though his questions seemed to indicate that he had zeroed in on just two of the possibilities: Kavanaugh and Hardiman.

Monday morning, after Trump was said to have arrived at his final decision, many in the White House said they were largely resigned to a “wait-and-see mode,” as one administration official put it. The vetting and background research was mostly complete, and they were simply waiting on Trump to announce his decision to the rest of the world.

On Monday afternoon, Trump called Hardiman to let him know, for a second time, that he would not receive the nod for the Supreme Court pick, according to an administration official. The White House also separately alerted Barrett and Kethledge.

The White House, further ramping up the anticipation, announced during the afternoon that Jon Kyl, a former Republican senator from Arizona, will shepherd the nominee through the confirmation process. Kyl, who was a member of the Judiciary Committee in the Senate, works as senior of counsel at the major law firm Covington. Some reading the tea leaves noted that Kyl helped Kavanaugh ascend to the federal bench after fighting off Democratic delay tactics.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell recommended the White House select Kyl, a former GOP whip, as the nominee’s sherpa, according to a Republican official. Kyl is well-liked among Republican senators and could be a crucial conduit to Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) in the Judiciary Committee. Flake has frequently criticized Trump and blocked some judicial nominees in committee in order to draw attention to his opposition to Trump’s Cuba and tariff policies.

The White House is preparing to put pressure on red-state Democrats to support Kavanaugh's nomination. Pence will participate in a series of interviews on Tuesday to promote Kavanaugh with local television and radio stations in the home states of Sens. Joe Manchin of West Virginia, Joe Donnelly of Indiana and Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota, according to an administration official.

Despite the well-prepared promotion plan, many White House aides, as of 7 p.m. Monday, said they did not know the name of Trump’s pick, amid reports that Kethledge was at his house in Michigan and Barrett was spotted by reporters at her home in South Bend, Indiana. Outside conservative groups, which knew Trump would pick Gorsuch the night before that announcement, were still standing by on this latest selection.

The White House planned to brief conservative groups, surrogates and Hill staff during two separate calls with McGahn later Monday night, but as of the early evening, many remained in the dark as to Trump’s final selection. Still, delighted by the opportunity to swing the court right, these groups stood by with ads ready to be rolled out, as Democratic opponents planned a TV blitz of their own.

As the drama built around the pick, Kavanaugh’s backers were telling reporters that they felt increasingly hopeful he would get the nod, despite what some involved in the process cast as a drumbeat of negative attacks against the early front-runner.

Some conservative critics, including those pushing for other possible nominees, sought to draw attention to a photo that ran last month in The Washington Post. It showed Kavanaugh being sworn in by Kennedy to the prestigious United States Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, with a smiling President George W. Bush standing off to his right. Below, Bush strategist Karl Rove is shown in another picture with his arm around a younger Kavanaugh.

The goal was to paint him as too close to Bush, knowing that Trump’s aversion to the family might sidetrack his early inclination to go with the leading candidate. Kavanaugh also was scrutinized about whether he was sufficiently conservative, with skeptics questioning his reliability on hot-button issues like abortion and Obamacare.

But it was his long paper trail from the Bush White House, and his time as a lawyer for Whitewater independent counsel Ken Starr, that even some of Kavanaugh’s supporters privately acknowledged helped stall his candidacy, forcing White House lawyers to scour hundreds of pages of records as the concerns of some Senate Republicans, including McConnell, went public.

One senior White House official, describing the jockeying taking place, said that at times it felt as though there were only two camps, instead of four: the people pulling for Kavanaugh, and the “anti-Kavanaugh folks.”

As for the recent concerns relating to the Starr probe, a person close to the process said the White House and outside counsel concluded they could get through the documents fairly quickly. Trump’s selection marked a swift rise for Kavanaugh, who wasn’t on Trump’s initial list of potential justices. During the 2016 campaign, McGahn was intent on nominating justices who lived and worked outside of the D.C. bubble, said two former administration officials. Others mentioned the Obamacare issue.

Kavanaugh and four others, including Barrett, were added to Trump's list late last year. Kavanaugh was kept off the first list because he was a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, and the president and his aides wanted the candidates on the list to heavily represent states that Trump carried in the 2016 election, according to two people familiar with the matter.

He was added at the urging of his many backers in the conservative legal community.

Kavanaugh is “not a clear outsider,” said one former Republican senior administration official. “I don’t think he’d have stayed off the list given his support from the Federalist Society and Heritage and, most particularly, McGahn.”

Observers said Trump, not one to back down when someone he wants to hire or retain in his Cabinet comes under fire, let the latest vetting process play out while focusing on what he sees as the bigger picture. He has told people that the opportunity to have two Supreme Court nominees during his first 18 months in office is historic, giving him the chance to reshape the direction of the courts and fulfill a major campaign promise.

Already Republicans close to the White House are predicting that Trump, if reelected in 2020, could have at least one additional Supreme Court seat to fill if Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg retires, given her advanced age. These aides said Trump viewed Barrett as an obvious choice for a third seat should it come up, even if this time around he was quick to eliminate her following their interview.

Kennedy’s seat, meantime, seemed destined to go to Kavanaugh, thanks in part to the glowing review of Kennedy, whose son, Justin, knows Donald Trump Jr. through New York real estate circles, and whose other adult child has connections to Trump world via the president’s 2016 Silicon Valley adviser Peter Thiel, most recently when the Kennedy firm Disruptive Technology Advisers worked with Thiel’s Palantir Technologies. Both Kennedy sons have been guests at the White House, and Trump had nice things to say about Justin in comments to Kennedy caught on a hot mic last year.

For a White House that had been taking the pulse of the court through the deep network of Kennedy law clerks, his retirement had long been on their wish list. And a year after Trump chose Gorsuch to serve with his mentor, he picked another ex-Kennedy aide to join him on the high court, a move that will shape how the president and the retired justice are remembered.

Trump “is very transactional in a lot of ways — as long as it’s fairly immediate to the benefit for him,” a Republican close to the White House said. “The fact that Kennedy gave him that, he was flattered and thrilled by it.”

Darren Samuelsohn, Lorraine Woellert and Burgess Everett contributed to this report.

