Who will Joe Biden nominate if Breyer retires?

[Donerail]

Here's what I think a "Biden shortlist" would look like, assuming 1. he releases one in the next few weeks and 2. he sticks to his promise to nominate a black woman.

District Courts

• Ketanji Brown Jackson (D. D.C.)
• Leslie Abrams Gardner (M.D. Ga.)
• Denise Casper (D. Mass.)
• Andrea Wood (N.D. Ill.)
• LaShann DeArcy Hall (E.D.N.Y.)
• Tanya Chutkan (D. D.C.)
• Wilhelmina Wright (D. Minn.)

State Supreme Courts

• Leondra Kruger (Cal.)
• Adrienne Nelson (Or.)
• Cheri Beasley (N.C.)
• Kimberly S. Budd (Mass.)

Litigators, politicians & academics

• Sherrilyn Ifill, President of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund
• Melissa Murray, Professor of Law, New York University
• Danielle Holley-Walker, Dean of Howard University School of Law
• Christina Swarns, Executive Director of the Innocence Project
• Michelle Alexander, author and past director of the Civil Rights Clinic at Stanford Law School
• Stacey Plaskett, Delegate to the U.S. House from the U.S. Virgin Islands

Of these, Kruger, Brown Jackson, and Abrams Gardner stand out as by far the most likely picks. I'd bet against Lynch being included on the shortlist, just because it might surface some controversy and I think Biden will be angling for the most moderate, low-profile list he can assemble (a nice counterpoint to whatever horrors will be on display in the confirmation hearings). The names in the top two categories are fairly limited by their membership, while the third is a bit more speculative, but I imagine he'll include a good mixture of figures from both the courts and the private sector (and Ifill, at least, is a lock to be considered).