Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and the Trump administration have already pushed through a record number of appeals court judges, and McConnell has signaled that will continue.

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“They will do whatever they can to fill it,” said Russell Wheeler of the Brookings Institution, who tracks judicial nominations. “I suspect they will be confirming judges even after Election Day.”

McConnell famously blocked President Barack Obama’s 2016 Supreme Court nomination of Judge Merrick Garland, refusing to consider it until after that presidential election. But the Senate leader has said he would help Trump fill a vacancy on the high court in 2020 if there is an opening.

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“The Leader’s motto for the year is ‘leave no vacancy behind,’ ” McConnell’s spokesman Doug Andres said Thursday.

The D.C. Circuit vacancy means Trump will be able to shape the future of the court, which has ruled on a set of separation-of-powers cases involving access to the president’s financial and tax records, congressional subpoenas and administration policies.

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Trump has named a record 51 judges to the nation’s 13 circuit courts, which are one step below the Supreme Court. Two of his nominees already serve on the D.C. Circuit — Gregory G. Katsas, Trump’s former deputy legal counsel, and Neomi Rao, who led the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs.

The White House declined to comment on how quickly it would move to nominate Griffith’s successor.

Griffith, 65, was nominated to the bench by President George W. Bush and is a former Senate legal counsel. His announcement surprised colleagues at the courthouse, where he has served since 2005.

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Griffith’s letter informing the president of his plan to leave the court, rather than take a reduced caseload, did not include a reason for his retirement. He was sitting on a three-judge panel Thursday morning and did not respond to a request for an interview.

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Griffith wrote the majority opinion last week in the House lawsuit seeking to enforce a subpoena for Trump’s former White House counsel Donald McGahn. Griffith sided with the Justice Department, finding that the court had no authority to intervene in a political dispute between the legislative and executive branches.

“We cannot decide this case without declaring the actions of one or the other unconstitutional, and ‘occasions for constitutional confrontation . . . should be avoided whenever possible,’ ” Griffith wrote.

He is also considered the pivotal vote in a separate pending case from House Democrats seeking access to secret grand jury material from the Russia investigation by former special counsel Robert S. Mueller III. That ruling could be issued at any time.

Griffith was one of the featured speakers at an event last month celebrating Garland’s tenure as chief judge. Griffith spoke soon after Trump criticized the judge presiding over the trial in Washington of the president’s confidant Roger Stone ahead of his sentencing.

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Griffith praised Garland and alluded generally to the political pressures on the courts.