Joe Biden CONFIRMS he will replace Justice Stephen Breyer with a black woman and will make the decision before the end of February

 President Joe Biden delivered remarks Thursday on the retirement of Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer - and confirmed he would select a black woman for Breyer's replacement. 

Biden said he would make his decision before the end of February.  

'This is sort of a bittersweet day for me,' the president said from the Roosevelt Room, with Breyer standing behind him. 'Justice Breyer and I go back a long way, all the way back to the 70s when he first came on the Judiciary Committee,' Biden noted.     

It would be a badly needed victory for Biden if he manages to get a new left-leaning justice confirmed with a razor thin 50-50 split in the Senate.

The president is already reportedly considering multiple potential replacements, all of whom fit his campaign promise to appoint a black woman to the high court.

Three candidates generating serious buzz are DC Circuit Court Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, California Supreme Court Justice Leondra Kruger and South Carolina District Court Judge J. Michelle Childs. 

Jackson and Childs were both tapped for promotions by Biden in 2021. Jackson was confirmed to her DC Circuit Court role in June, while Childs was nominated to the same bench in December. 

Democrats are already racing against the clock to get whoever Biden chooses onto the bench, with the 2022 midterm elections looming at the end of the year. 

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Senate Judiciary Chair Richard Durbin released statements on Wednesday that stressed their preferred short timeline.

Biden will deliver remarks on Breyer's retirement but it's unclear if the outgoing Justice will speak himself

Breyer, 83, was reported to be retiring from the high court on Wednesday before a formal announcement was made

'President Biden’s nominee will receive a prompt hearing in the Senate Judiciary Committee and will be considered and confirmed by the full United States Senate with all deliberate speed,' Schumer said.

Durbin added that he looked 'forward to moving the President’s nominee expeditiously through the Committee.' 

Breyer is one of three liberals on the Supreme Court, alongside Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan. Former President Donald Trump was able to fill three empty slots during his four-year term, giving the court a decisive conservative supermajority.

Calls for the octogenarian justice to retire swelled after Biden won the 2020 election.

The reported pressure on Breyer increased as Republicans' chances of taking back the Congressional majority in November 2022 swelled. 

Associate Justice Brett Kavanaugh, Associate Justice Elena Kagan, Associate Justice Neil Gorsuch, Associate Justice Amy Coney Barrett, Associate Justice Samuel Alito, Associate Justice Clarence Thomas, Chief Justice John Roberts, Associate Justice Stephen Breyer and Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor pose for a group photo at the Supreme Court in April 2021

Breyer was appointed to the high court by President Bill Clinton, who announced his decision in 1994

Democrats have faced significant GOP roadblocks to the high court in the past -- after late Justice Antonin Scalia's passing, then-Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell successfully blocked Barack Obama's nominee, now Attorney General Merrick Garland, from even getting a hearing in 2015. 

Obama had reportedly tried to convince late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg to retire in 2013 to give him an earlier chance at getting another liberal on the court. She apparently rebuffed calls to step down, before dying on the bench under the Trump administration and enabling him to appoint young conservative Justice Amy Coney Barrett.

Confirming judicial nominees only requires a simply majority vote in the Senate, thanks to a 2013 rules change.

That means Biden would need every Democrat to vote in lock-step or his pick would need to persuade at least one or two Republican lawmakers. 

All eyes are now turned to moderate Senators Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema, whose reservations led to the deaths or at least indefinite pauses to two key Biden agenda items: the $1.75 trillion Build Back Better bill and scuttling the filibuster to enact federal voting rights legislation.

But historically, he should have more luck getting them on board here. Neither Manchin nor Sinema have voted against one of the president's judicial picks so far.

Manchin released a statement on Wednesday signaling he was open to considering Breyer's replacement, but it was noticeably void of the rushed language in Schumer and Durbin's sentiments.

'I take my Constitutional responsibility to advise and consent on a nominee to the Supreme Court very seriously,' Manchin said.

'I look forward to meeting with and evaluating the qualifications of President Biden’s nominee to fill this Supreme Court vacancy.'

DailyMail.com has reached out to both Manchin and Sinema's offices.