Judge Neil Gorsuch was on the list of judges that President Donald Trump promised he would choose from during the campaign. | AP Photo Trump picks Gorsuch for Supreme Court The 49-year-old federal appeals court judge would be the court's first conservative addition in a decade.

President Donald Trump on Tuesday tapped Judge Neil Gorsuch for the Supreme Court, elevating a 49-year-old judge who has served on a federal appeals court for more than a decade to replace the late Justice Antonin Scalia.

“When Justice Scalia passed away suddenly last February, I made a promise to the American people: If I were elected president, I would find the very best judge in the country for the Supreme Court,” Trump said. “I promised to select someone who respects our laws and is representative of our Constitution and who loves our Constitution and someone who will interpret them as written.”


Trump used his characteristic superlatives to introduce Gorsuch, calling him the “best” judge for the job and praising his credentials without expounding on the specifics of his legal philosophy. Trump even touted Gorsuch’s Ivy League pedigree — the kind of affiliations Trump has sometimes denigrated as breeding grounds for the out-of-touch elite.

"Mr. President, I am honored and I am humbled," Gorsuch said after being introduced.

Trump’s sons Donald Jr. and Eric sat in the front row during the announcement. Vice President Mike Pence and his wife, Karen, were also in attendance, as were a number of congressional leaders. Scalia’s widow, Maureen, was also in the audience.

Gorsuch pledged that, if confirmed, he would serve as “a faithful servant of the constitution and laws of this great country.”

“The Supreme Court’s work is vital not just to a region of the country, but to the whole, vital to the protections of the people’s liberties under law and to the continuity of our constitution — the greatest charter of human liberty the world has ever known,” Gorsuch said.

In his remarks, Gorsuch praised Scalia. “Justice Scalia was a lion of the law. Agree or disagree with him, all of his colleagues on the bench cherished his wisdom and his humor. And like them, I miss him,” he said.

Gorsuch was on the list of judges that Trump promised he would choose from during the campaign, and his selection to the high court is expected to rally conservative activists who successfully pushed Republicans to block hearings for Judge Merrick Garland, former President Barack Obama’s pick, after Scalia’s death in February 2016.

Gorsuch was appointed to the circuit court in 2006 by George W. Bush. He was confirmed by a Senate voice vote, meaning there were no objections to his confirmation but individual senators' votes were not recorded. Trump touted Gorsuch as having been confirmed "unanimously."

Gorsuch said he cherishes the traits he considers essential to a judge — “impartiality and independence, collegiality and courage” — and said he looks forward to his hearing before the Senate, which he called the “greatest deliberative body in the world.”

Gorsuch’s statement provided some hints that he’s what legal scholars call an "originalist" or "textualist," favoring a literal meaning of statutes and the Constitution.

“I respect, too, the fact that in our legal order it is for Congress, and not the courts, to write new laws,” Gorsuch said. “It is the role of judges to apply, not alter, the work of the people’s representatives. A judge who likes every outcome you reach is very likely a bad judge — stretching for results he prefers rather than those the law demands.”

View Who is Judge Neil Gorsuch? President Donald Trump nominated Judge Neil Gorsuch from the 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals to fill the vacant seat of the late Justice Antonin Scalia.

And he made a nod to his religion: “I am so thankful tonight for my family, my friends and my faith,” he said. “These are the things that keep me grounded at life’s peaks and that sustain me in its valleys.”

If confirmed, Gorsuch is unlikely to swing the ideological balance on the court. Legal experts see him as largely falling in line with the conservative bloc, as did Scalia. But, at 49, he would be the youngest justice on the court and represent an infusion of new blood into conservative ranks that have not seen an addition for a decade.

Democrats have threatened to filibuster Trump's nominee, and the Senate's top Democrat criticized Gorsuch's record on Tuesday night.

“The burden is on Judge Neil Gorsuch to prove himself to be within the legal mainstream and, in this new era, willing to vigorously defend the Constitution from abuses of the executive branch and protect the constitutionally enshrined rights of all Americans,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said. “Given his record, I have very serious doubts about Judge Gorsuch’s ability to meet this standard.”

Democratic Sens. Sherrod Brown of Ohio, Ron Wyden of Oregon, Jeff Merkley of Oregon, Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Ed Markey of Massachusetts have all indicated they'll vote against the nominee.

Senate Republicans praised Trump's pick and noted that Democrats had not blocked him from joining the appeals court. "Eleven years ago, the Senate was so confident in Judge Gorsuch’s abilities that it confirmed him by voice vote," said Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas). "In the time since, he has shown himself worthy of that distinction, and I would hope that my Senate colleagues give him the respect he deserves this time around, as well, and support his confirmation.”

Gorsuch has the typical pedigree of a high court justice. He graduated from Columbia, Harvard and Oxford, clerked for two Supreme Court justices and did a stint at the Department of Justice.

He attended Harvard Law with Obama. On Tuesday afternoon, Obama's former ethics czar, Norm Eisen, another classmate, tweeted: "Hearing rumors Trump's likely Supreme Court pick is Neil Gorsuch, my (and President Obama's!) 1991 Harvard Law classmate.If so, a great guy!"

Since 2006, he has served on the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, and he is praised by conservative scholars for the clarity and force of his writing.

“Neil Gorsuch is one of the most respected conservative originalist legal intellectuals of his generation,” said Jeffrey Rosen of the National Constitution Center. “He’s unusual for his memorable writing style, the depth of his reading and his willingness to rethink constitutional principles from the ground up. Like Justice Scalia, he sometimes reaches results that favor liberals when he thinks the history or text of the Constitution or the law require it, especially in areas like criminal law or the rights of religious minorities, but unlike Scalia he’s less willing to defer to regulations and might be more willing to second-guess Trump’s regulatory decisions.”

Gorsuch is a favorite of legal conservatives because he has sharply questioned a three-decade-old legal precedent that many on the right believe has given too much power to the regulatory state. The landmark 1984 Supreme Court ruling involving the Chevron oil company held that courts should defer to federal agencies’ reasonable interpretations of ambiguous federal laws.

In a ruling last August in an immigration case, Gorsuch questioned the wisdom of that doctrine, arguing that the meaning of the law is for judges to decide, not federal bureaucrats.

“Where in all this does a court interpret the law and say what it is?” Gorsuch asked in an extended digression on the subject. “When does a court independently decide what the statute means and whether it has or has not vested a legal right in a person? Where Chevron applies that job seems to have gone extinct.”

Other rulings give conservatives confidence that Gorsuch is a strong supporter of religious freedom rights. Last September, he joined a dissent arguing that requirements for contraception coverage in Obamacare ran roughshod over the rights of religious nonprofits.

View Trump picks Gorsuch for Supreme Court President Donald Trump picks Neil Gorsuch for Supreme Court on Tuesday.

Gorsuch also wrote a 2000 law journal article and a 2006 book arguing strongly against assisted-suicide laws. The practice of allowing the terminally ill to end their lives is now legal in six states and is on the verge of being legalized in Washington, D.C.

Gorsuch was confirmed to the Denver-based appeals court by a voice vote. His confirmation to the Supreme Court is expected to be contentious. Republicans hold a 52-48 advantage in the Senate, but Democrats, led by Schumer, are expected to force Republicans to muster 60 votes through a filibuster.

Trump has suggested Republicans should eliminate the filibuster if Democrats use it, but Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has been more circumspect about that idea, saying it remains up to the Senate, not the White House.

Gorsuch has seen the grinder of Washington, D.C., up close. His mother, Anne Burford Gorsuch, ran the Environmental Protection Agency under President Ronald Reagan but resigned under pressure amid a criminal investigation and a House contempt of Congress citation over records related to alleged political favoritism in toxic-waste cleanups.

She maintained her innocence and was never charged in the matter.

Gorsuch is from Colorado. His supporters note that he is an outdoorsman who fishes, hunts and skies. On the court, conservatives hope he could become the intellectual heir to Scalia, long the outspoken leader of the conservative bloc.

“The real appeal of Gorsuch's nomination is he’s likely to be the most effective conservative nominee in terms of winning over Anthony Kennedy and forging conservative decisions on the court,” Rosen said. “He clerked for Justice Kennedy, and they like and trust each other. If any nominee could sway Kennedy to conservative decisions, it would be Gorsuch.”

