media speculation that one of either two female judges on the Fifth Circuit would be selected: moderate Edith Brown Clement or conservative Edith Jones. Clement was considered the frontrunner. About an hour before the televised announcement, however, information was leaked to the press concerning the choice of Roberts. On September 3, 2005, Chief Justice Rehnquist died. Three days later, on September 6, Bush officially nominated Roberts to be the next chief justice, and simultaneously withdrew Roberts's then-pending nomination to be an associate justice, once again leaving no nominee to replace O‘Connor. Hearings on the Roberts associate justice nomination, set to begin on September 6, were cancelled, and rescheduled hearings, on the chief justice nomination, began on September 12. Possible O'Connor replacements On September 6, Specter encouraged the President to fill O'Connor's position with a woman, saying that the Supreme Court should have a minimum of two female justices. On September 9, Laura Bush reiterated her previous wish to also see a female nominee. On the Thursday before Roberts' confirmation hearing commenced, one of Reid's aides said that the nomination of several candidates said to be on the president's short list to replace O'Connor—conservative appellate Judges J. Michael Luttig, Emilio Garza and Edith Jones—would be unacceptable to the Democrats, implying that any of them would be filibustered. Several days later, Specter made it known that he felt that it was too early for Bush to elevate Attorney General Alberto Gonzales to the Supreme Court. Roberts' confirmation hearing for chief justice was held from Monday, September 12, to Friday, September 16. During the week of the hearing, there was much talk that Priscilla Owen would be the next nominee, but columnist Robert Novak reported that by Friday, Reid had told Frist that Judge Owen would also be filibustered if chosen. On Wednesday, September 21, Bush had another meeting with Senators Frist, Specter, Reid and Leahy to discuss possible Supreme Court nominations. On the day before, Laura Bush mentioned publicly for the third time that she would like to see a female nominee. At the same time, Reid stated that the nomination of any of the previously filibustered appellate nominees would be viewed by the Democrats as "a poke in the eye with a sharp stick". He restated this position during the meeting with the President when he warned against nominating either Brown or Owen. Again, Reid and Leahy offered the names of