Who is Merrick Garland, Obama nominee to the US Supreme Court?

The White House has confirmed that Merrick Garland as been notimated to take the place of late Chief Justice Antonin Scalia.

Garland, 63, was special assistant to the attoey general of the U.S. from 1979 to 1981.

He served as an assistant U.S. attoey for the District of Columbia from 1989 to 1992, and as eeputy assistant attoey general in the Criminal Division of the U.S. Department of Justice from 1993 to 1994. From 1994 until his appointment as U.S. circuit judge, Garland served as principal associate deputy attoey general. 

In September 1995, fomer president Bill Clinton nominated Garland to the D.C. Circuit seat after it was vacated by Abner J. Mikva.

In 2010, he was a leading contender for a nomination to the Supreme Court following the announced retirement of Justice John Paul Stevens in 2010.

Garland was bo in Chicago and graduated from Harvard Law School in 1977.

He is the oldest person to be nominated to the Supreme Court since President Nixon named Justice Lewis Powell in 1972 when he was 64 years old.