In 2016, then Notre Dame Law School professor Amy Coney Barrett argued that a replacement for the late Justice Antonin Scalia should not be seated during an election year by a Democratic president because “it would flip the bounds of power in the court.”
Barrett, a staunch conservative on the opposite end of the political spectrum from the justice she has been selected to replace, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, stated that the selection of Merrick Garland to replace Scalia was not only improper, but the selection should happen after the election.
“We’re talking about Justice Scalia, y’know, the staunchest conservative on the Court, and we’re talking about him being replaced by someone who could dramatically flip the, ah, balance of power on the Court,” Barrett said in a 2016 interview on CBSN. “It’s not a lateral move.”