US Supreme Court judge Ruth Bader Ginsburg dies of cancer aged 87
US Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg died of cancer at the age of 87, the court has said.
Ginsburg passed away at her home in Washington on Friday, surrounded by her family, following a battle with metastatic pancreatic cancer, the statement said.
She was the oldest justice and just second woman to ever sit on the Supreme Court, having been appointed in 1993.
The prominent feminist and figurehead for liberals revealed she was undergoing chemotherapy earlier this year, following a recurrence of cancer.
“Our Nation has lost a jurist of historic stature,” Chief Justice John Roberts said in a statement on Friday.
“We at the Supreme Court have lost a cherished colleague. Today we mourn, but with confidence that future generations will remember Ruth Bader Ginsburg as we knew her – a tireless and resolute champion of justice.”
Ginsburg was one of four liberals on the justice court. Her death raises the possibility of US President Donald Trump trying to expand the slender conservative majority on the court ahead of November’s election.
He is expected to appoint nominate a conservative replacement as soon as possible.
Presidential candidate Joe Biden has said the appointment should be made after the US election.
And Ginsburg expressed her strong disapproval of Trump making such a move in the days before her death.
“My most fervent wish is that I will not be replaced until a new president is installed,” she wrote in a statement to her granddaughter, according to National Public Radio.
Reacting to the news of Ginsburg’s death following a rally in Minnesota, Trump said: “I didn’t know that. She led an amazing life, what else can you say?”
He later tweeted a statement, calling her a “titan of law” and a “brilliant mind”.