If President Donald Trump gets to nominate another Supreme Court justice before the midterm elections, he will likely have the 6-3 ruling against his tariffs on his mind.

The conservative bloc of the Supreme Court, and his own nominees, were divided on the tariffs decision, which Trump called “disappointing” and “very unfortunate” in his State of the Union address but used far harsher language when he spoke to reporters after it was handed down.

In the end, two of the three Trump-appointed justices voted against the president’s position on his signature economic policy, with only Justice Brett Kavanaugh pleasing him.

The two most conservative justices appointed by other Republican presidents, Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito, voted with Trump. They are also the two most likely justices to retire, creating vacancies for Trump to fill.

Thomas, 77, was nominated by George H.W. Bush in 1991. He will turn 78 in June. Alito, 75, was nominated by George W. Bush in 2005 and confirmed in early 2006. He will turn 76 in April.

Trump risks ending up with a less-aligned justice, even if he fills the seat with a proven legal conservative, since Thomas and Alito are his most supportive members of the court.

The Trump Supreme Court record has been a source of pride and unity among conservatives over the past decade.

Senate Republicans kept the late Justice Antonin Scalia’s seat vacant for more than a year so Trump could replace the iconic conservative jurist with Justice Neil Gorsuch. Former President Barack Obama had sought to fill the vacancy with Merrick Garland, who would go on to serve as attorney general in the Biden administration. Trump, who had little record on social or conservative legal issues during his first presidential campaign, had promised to choose Scalia’s successor from a list of names acceptable to conservatives.

Trump weathered sexual misconduct allegations against Kavanaugh in a midterm election year to get him confirmed. Christine Blasey Ford testified that Kavanaugh had sexually assaulted her decades earlier when they were both teenagers, a charge Kavanaugh categorically denied and for which she was unable to provide evidence or much detail.

After the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a stalwart member of the liberal bloc who held on to her seat through old age and illness, Trump moved quickly to replace her with a conservative in a presidential election year. Justice Amy Coney Barrett was confirmed on Oct. 26, 2020, not long before Election Day.

Trump’s conservative makeover of the Supreme Court paid dividends. The nation’s highest court has since been seen as having a durable 6-3 conservative majority on many contested constitutional questions. Among other important rulings, this majority overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022. All three of Trump’s appointees voted to junk the long-standing liberal precedent on abortion.

That would seem like encouraging history if Trump were to get the opportunity to nominate another Supreme Court justice. But Trump was outraged by the tariff decision. His relationship with the conservative legal movement has frayed since his first term and has called former Federalist Society official Leonard Leo a “sleazebag.” 

The Trump White House is clearly more spooked by the abortion issue than during the first term. Mike Pence is now an outside agitator who clashes with the administration rather than the vice president. Trump’s relationship with retiring Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY), who helped him confirm conservative judges when he was the GOP floor leader, is even more contentious than it is with the Federalist Society. And despite the media portrayal of the Supreme Court as some kind of MAGA outpost, Trump feels burned by some of his past nominees.

A vacancy before the midterm elections would raise interesting political questions regardless. Republicans and social conservatives, especially abortion opponents, may rally to the GOP in support of a Trump nominee. The Resistance is already highly motivated, but a Supreme Court nomination fight could help Democrats campaign on abortion and remind voters of the Dobbs decision overturning Roe.

Despite all the rumors, no justice has given any indication that they plan to retire. The speculation has centered on Thomas and Alito because they are older and would prefer that their replacements be chosen by a Republican president. But neither of them has said they have plans to depart the court anytime soon. 

Trump, at this point, may not want them to go.