Ginsburg after cancer treatment: ‘I am pleased to say that I am feeling very good tonight’

Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said Tuesday night she is feeling “very good” after completing three weeks of radiation treatment for a malignant tumor on her pancreas.

Ginsburg was responding to a question from NPR legal affairs correspondent Nina Totenberg as to why she kept her scheduled appearance Tuesday at an event for the Clinton Foundation in Little Rock, Ark., so shortly after finishing her treatment.

{mosads}“I had promised the Clinton Library that I would be here, and I was just not going to — and I am pleased to say that I am feeling very good tonight,” she said to raucous applause and a standing ovation.

The Supreme Court announced in August that Ginsburg had undergone the treatment at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York City, saying she “tolerated treatment well.” She made her first public appearance following the treatment last week.

At 86 years old, Ginsburg is the Supreme Court’s oldest justice and has sat on the court’s nine-member bench for 26 years. She has faced bouts of cancer during her tenure, undergoing surgery in 1999 for colorectal cancer, a procedure for pancreatic cancer in 2009 and another operation to remove two malignant nodules in her lungs in December.

Ginsburg said her work on the high court has helped distract her from her health issues.

“I think my work is what saved me because instead of dwelling on my physical discomforts, if I have an opinion to write or I have a brief to read I know I’ve just got to get it done, and so I have to get over it,” she said Tuesday.

Ginsburg has been lionized by her liberal supporters, who see her as a bulwark against the conservatives on the Court, though observers continue to pay close attention to her health.