"Many lawyers" observing the federal appellate courts think a handful of judges are "auditioning" for President Trump ahead of anticipated Supreme Court vacancies, based on their "flashy opinions," according to The Washington Post.

The swamp's hometown paper, which lost $100 million last year, said a "growing number of firebrand conservative judges are making themselves hard to ignore" as Senate Republicans make plans to confirm a nominee before midterm elections, while they still have the Senate majority, in the event of a SCOTUS exit on short notice, most likely Justice Samuel Alito.

Trump and his circle will require "some kind of further signals of loyalty to the agenda" than presidents usually expect from nominees, Washington University law professor Daniel Epps said.

Both Harvard law professor Adrian Vermeule, a prominent postliberal scholar, and California Attorney General Rob Bonta speculated to the Post that 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Lawrence VanDyke was auditioning over the past several months through his dissents.

"This is a case about swinging dicks," VanDyke wrote in dissent when the full court refused to reconsider a three-judge panel that sided with an anatomical male demanding access to a female-only nude spa in Seattle based on gender identity. 

To those who object to his language, "I hope we all can agree that it is far more jarring for the unsuspecting and exposed women at Olympus Spa — some as young as thirteen — to be visually assaulted by the real thing," he wrote. 

Vermeule called the "break from judicial norms" a "way to recommend himself to a norm-breaking President," while the conservative National Review described VanDyke's style as "postmodern" and "an ironical approach to the practice of judging deployed in support of deeply sincere normative legal views."

VanDyke also filmed himself disassembling a handgun and explaining how it works, "with a Kalashnikov assault rifle mounted behind him" as the Post noted, in a video dissent to the majority upholding a California ban on gun magazines that hold more than 10 rounds. Bonta called the video "unprecedented" and "a problem."

Others rumored to be auditioning include 5th Circuit Judge James Ho, who "appeared to shift his position on birthright citizenship" after Trump's 2024 election and was deemed "provocative" by the Post for calling abortion a "moral tragedy."

The Post flagged Ho's colleague Andrew Oldham as seeking Trump's attention by referring to theories that "Joe Biden was mentally unfit to issue a flurry of pardons in the final days of his presidency" in one opinion, and dissenting when the 5th Circuit invalidated Trump's deportation of alleged Venezuelan gang members to a Salvadoran prison, saying judges can't "demand the President’s homework."