Which Supreme Court justices will resign during Trump's term?

**Stage 1 — Blind analysis (ignore market price):**

- Independent assessment: Based strictly on the publicly available facts — Thomas's age (77), his long tenure and stated desire to serve, his active handling of emergency matters and participation in opinions, and the absence of any credible reports that he plans to step down — I place the probability that he resigns during Trump’s term at **~18%**. This reflects a low-to-modest chance driven mainly by the nonzero risk of sudden health problems or a major scandal that materially changes his political standing.

- Rationale: Historically, Supreme Court justices retire at widely varying ages, but those who signal a desire to remain and who continue to perform full duties rarely retire on short notice absent health decline. Impeachment or forced removal is extraordinarily difficult politically; even with vocal advocacy groups and House resolutions, removal requires a Senate supermajority or a voluntary resignation. Thomas’s continued docket activity (handling emergency filings, issuing dissents) is strong behavioral evidence against imminent resignation. The ethics controversies increase uncertainty, but to date they have not produced a workable removal mechanism or clear incentive for Thomas himself to step down.

- Quantitative intuition: Treating resignation as a low-probability, high-impact event over ~2.6–3.5 years remaining in the term, I model a baseline annual resignation hazard for a similarly situated 77-year-old, fully active justice who has signaled long-term service at ~6–8% per year, but discount that because Thomas has shown resistance to pressure and remains functionally active — leading to an aggregated cumulative probability over the remainder of the term of ~15–22%. I set 18% as a central estimate.

- Key uncertainties that could raise the probability in the blind model: emergence of concrete, damaging new revelations about personal conduct or finances; a sudden serious medical event; or an internal deal or personal reason prompting a planned exit. None of these are currently evidenced publicly, so they remain tail risks.

**Stage 2 — Market calibration (look at current market prices Yes: 0.37):**

- The market currently prices a 37% chance of resignation — roughly double my independent estimate. Possible reasons the market is higher than my blind probability: - *News sensitivity and salience bias*: Ongoing coverage of Thomas’s ethics controversies may lead traders to overweight reputational risk and expect a politically expedient exit. High-profile petitions and impeachment resolutions can create headline-driven trading even when procedural removal is unlikely. - *Hedging and correlated bets*: Some traders may be buying 'Yes' as a hedge against other correlated events (e.g., multiple vacancies), raising the price beyond the pure likelihood of Thomas alone resigning. - *Speculative flows and retail momentum*: Public campaigns (MoveOn, AOC impeachment articles) can mobilize retail action that pushes prices toward perceived political outcomes, regardless of institutional inertia. - *Confusion about timeframe or conflation with other justices*: Traders may be conflating higher-probability resignations by other justices (e.g., older justices or those with known health issues) and misallocating probability mass to Thomas.

- Why I think the market is likely mispricing the event: The market seems to overweight politically salient but procedurally unlikely mechanisms (resignation under pressure, negotiated ouster, or voluntary exit absent a health trigger). Given the Court’s norms, the difficulty of impeachment/removal, and Thomas’s ongoing active duties, the higher price implies expectations of new, substantive shocks that are not currently evidenced. If those shocks occur, the market could quickly reprice upward; absent them, the current price represents an overestimate of near-term resignation risk.

- How to trade or interpret the difference: If one accepts my blind assessment (18%), 'No' is the value play relative to the market. Conversely, if a trader believes that ongoing ethics campaigns or hidden health problems are substantially more likely to produce a resignation than public facts suggest, the market price could be justified.