FAYETTEVILLE, N.C./WASHINGTON - President Donald Trump said he would nominate a woman to sit on the U.S. Supreme Court, following the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
"I will be putting forth a nominee next week. It will be a woman," Trump said Saturday at a campaign rally in Fayetteville, North Carolina. "I think it should be a woman because I actually like women much more than men."
As Trump spoke, supporters chanted: "Fill that seat."
Earlier, he praised two women as possible choices for the U.S. Supreme Court: conservatives he had elevated to federal appeals courts.
Trump, with a chance to nominate a third justice to a lifetime appointment, named Amy Coney Barrett of the Chicago-based 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals and Barbara Lagoa of the Atlanta-based 11th Circuit as possible nominees.
Ginsburg's death on Friday from cancer after 27 years on the court handed Trump, who is seeking re-election on November 3, the opportunity to expand its conservative majority to 6-3.
Any nomination would require approval in the Senate, where Trump's Republicans hold a 53-47 majority.