That short answer carries enormous significance as Republicans look ahead to the November midterm elections and the possibility that control of the Senate could change hands.
Alito, appointed to the Supreme Court by President George W. Bush in 2006, has now completed 20 full terms on the nation’s highest court.
He is currently the second-oldest member of the Court, behind 78-year-old Justice Clarence Thomas.
Both men have become towering figures on the conservative side of the judiciary, and speculation about their futures has intensified with Republicans currently positioned to confirm another conservative justice should a vacancy emerge.
For Alito, however, retirement apparently isn’t on the immediate agenda.
The Supreme Court is currently on its summer recess and is scheduled to return for its next term in October. That term will run into the summer of 2027.
Questions surrounding Alito’s future exploded in late June after NPR correspondent Nina Totenberg incorrectly reported that the justice was retiring.
The report was quickly withdrawn.
The Supreme Court made clear that Alito had made no retirement announcement, and Totenberg later explained that the erroneous report came after she misunderstood an announcement involving retiring staff members.
The episode only added fuel to an already raging debate over whether Alito or Thomas should step aside while a Republican president and Republican-controlled Senate could potentially choose their successors.
Some conservatives have argued that an early retirement would protect the Court’s current ideological balance for another generation.
But lifetime appointments don’t come with political expiration dates, and Alito appears well aware of the growing chorus of people trying to predict when he will finally walk away.
Asked whether he notices the constant speculation, Alito responded with some dark humor.
“It’s not pleasant, in the sense that it’s a reminder of mortality. It’s like, what are those vultures doing up there? They are flying around. But it goes with life tenure.”
While Alito committed himself to another term, he stopped short of offering any timetable for what might happen after that.
That means the retirement guessing game is unlikely to disappear.
The stakes could become considerably higher after November.
If Democrats capture the Senate in the 2026 midterms, any future Supreme Court vacancy could turn into a bruising confirmation battle. A change in Senate control could dramatically complicate a Republican president’s ability to replace a retiring conservative justice with a similarly conservative nominee.
Alito also used the interview to push back against one of the most persistent accusations aimed at the Court’s conservative majority: that its justices simply deliver outcomes favored by President Trump or the Republican Party.
Alito flatly rejected that characterization.
“I vote in every case the way I think the case should be decided,” he said. “If that means a high correlation with what Trump wants, fine. If it means zero correlation with what Trump wants, fine as well.”
Alito said he isn’t interested in manufacturing artificial ideological balance from one case to another.
Instead, his approach is straightforward: determine what he believes the law requires, explain that reasoning in his opinion, and allow the public, legal scholars, politicians and fellow justices to decide whether they agree.
That philosophy has made Alito one of the most dependable conservative voices on the modern Supreme Court.
The Court’s current 6-3 conservative majority was cemented during Trump’s first term following the appointments of Justices Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett.
Alito and Thomas, however, predate all three.
Over decades on the bench, the two have developed reputations as the Court’s most consistently conservative members, particularly in closely divided cases involving constitutional interpretation, executive authority, religious liberty and other major legal questions.
That makes the future of both justices a subject of intense interest on the Right.
A Supreme Court seat can shape American law for decades. The timing of a retirement can therefore matter almost as much politically as the identity of the justice leaving.
For the moment, conservatives wondering whether one of the Court’s most influential members is preparing to call it quits finally have their answer.
Alito isn’t going anywhere — at least not before another Supreme Court term is in the books.
And judging by his “vultures” remark, the longtime justice knows plenty of people will continue circling for an answer about what comes after that.
