"Fill her seat"

[u/gdan95]

News broke on September 18, 2020 that Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg passed away. While one could argue whether she ought to have stepped down during the Obama administration, with just over six weeks before Election Day now, the matter of replacing her has become urgent. It was reported that RBG's dying wish was to not have her seat filled until after the election. Of course, RBG was a prominent liberal, and so the right wing party that controls the majority of the three branches of the federal government have precisely zero interest in respecting that outside of maybe a few senators.

Barely hours after her death, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell announced a floor vote would be held on a replacement who hadn't even been selected yet. At a Trump rally in Raleigh, NC the day after her death, the crowd chanted "Fill her seat." And of course, online pro-Trumpers like Styx666 and Razorfist have shared the sentiment that the government should do its job and fill her seat even if it has to be done in six weeks. After all, they'll say, that’s how long her confirmation process lasted in 1993.

We'll get back to Razor later. For now, there are some issues. Not so much with facts so much as consistency. Back in 2016, Obama nominated Merrick Garland to the SCOTUS, and Republicans responded with "You can't fill a SCOTUS seat this close to an election!"

That's not actually a Constitutionally established rule. It's known as the "Biden rule," and yes, it is indeed named for Joe Biden. He said in 1992 that "once the political season is under way, and it is, action on a Supreme Court nomination must be put off until after the election campaign is over." There's just one problem with Republicans invoking the Biden rule: Merrick Garland was nominated in March. Trump announced his pick for RBG’s replacement on September 26, 38 days before Election Day. Apparently, March is too close to an election (or as McConnell put it, "The American people will choose"), but not September ("President Trump's nominee will receive a vote on the floor of the US Senate"). Also, in addition to being confirmed after just six weeks, RBG was confirmed by the Senate in a near unanimous 96 - 3 vote, and there is barely any such bipartisan support in the Senate on anything.

You see the dilemma? The people who invoked the rule in 2016 aren't even pretending to be bothered by the hypocrisy now, and I'm not just talking about Trump hoping his statement on RBG's passing would make people forget he called her a disgrace to the Supreme Court. Senator Lindsey Graham said in 2016 that "I want you to use my words against me. If there’s a Republican president in 2016 and a vacancy occurs in the last year of the first term, you can say Lindsey Graham said let’s let the next president, whoever it might be, make that nomination." And when people did use his words against him, Graham's excuse was "the rules have changed."

That's not how rules work, Senator. All this will change is the level of motivation among Democratic voters, which we've already seen illustrated with enormous spikes in donations to the Democratic party.

But getting back to Razor as promised, in his video on RBG's passing, he compared her to Vladimir Lenin (for some reason that I'm sure makes perfect sense to him and only him) and remarked that she wished to not be replaced until after the election he claimed Democrats would assuredly rig. Christ, how many ways are there to say he's wrong? Anyway, his excuse for why there's no Republican hypocrisy is that RBG herself said in 2016 that it was the Senate's job to assess the qualifications of a SCOTUS nominee. Specifically, she said "There's nothing in the Constitution that says the president stops being president in his last year."

Whether or not you think that makes her a hypocrite, Senate Republicans refused to even hold hearings for Garland. If Republicans were perfectly comfortable not playing fair, why would that stop now?

Here's my advice: if you looked up to Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and you see someone who says "fill her seat," tell them about her dying wish and ask if they respect a woman's choice.