It might simultaneously be true that Republicans should wait to fill RBG’s seat because the election is near; that it is an act of stunning hypocrisy to fill it after refusing to act on Garland; and that, if the politics were reversed, Democrats would have done the same thing.
I should add, in response to comments, that by "Democrats would have done the same thing," I was referring to pushing forward now with a nominee with so little time before the election. /1
I don't have a strong sense of what Dems would have done with the 2016 equivalent of Garland -- would they have just voted him down, vs. not held a vote, for example. (But I also don't see a lot of difference between those two options.) /2
The flipped hypo would be something like this. Imagine Justice Scalia had died 45 days before the 2016 election, and the Senate was Democratic. All the polls suggest a Republican will be elected in 45 days, and the Senate may flip R. /3
All the big legal issues that your side cares most about -- abortion rights, affirmative action, LGBT rights, the environment -- are all up for grabs. Do you push forward a nominee now, ensuring those rights? Or do you risk them and let the next Prez (likely an R) fill the seat?
I think the proper thing to do, so close to the election, is to risk it and let the next Prez fill the seat, even if it means all those rights are lost. But I tend to be doubtful that is what would actually happen in that scenario. My sense, at least. /end
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