President George W. Bush announced that he would nominate Judge John Roberts as the Supreme Court's 17th chief justice on September 5, 2005, two days after the death of Chief Justice William Rehnquist, and five weeks after selecting him as an associate justice to succeed retiring Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. The following day, Bush officially nominated Roberts to be the next chief justice, and simultaneously withdrew Roberts's still-pending associate justice nomination. Confirmation hearings on the Roberts associate justice nomination, set to begin on September 6, were canceled, and rescheduled hearings, on the chief justice nomination, began on September 12.