There are a lot of comparisons between Trump's appointment of Amy Barrett and Obama's appointment of Merrick Garland. There is one HUGE difference that makes all the difference. The President's party is in control of the Senate at the time of the appointment.
People seem to not understand that the appointments to the Federal Judiciary are at the “Advice & Consent of the Senate”. The advice and consent of the Senate of the Garland appointment was “we will not approve him”. Although I thought at the time and still think now it would have been better to have the vote and the appointment be ended that way, it is well within the Senate’s purview to say “No” prior to the vote. It is forgotten that Garland would have not been approved in all likelihood even with the vote.
The other point is this: the people have spoken and had input into the appointment of the next Supreme Court justice - in 2016 they voted in Donald Trump (I know that argument is somewhat negated by the fact that Obama was the duly elected president in 2016 - I accept that) The main “voice” of the people was voting in 2018 to leave the Senate with a Republican majority. Everyone that is politically savvy at all knows that the Senate confirms Presidential appointments. If they don’t realize they confirm most of them, they surely know they confirm the Supremes! The 2018 election was the chance for the “voice of the people” on any Trump appointments, just as the 2014 elections were for any Obama ones. If the Senate is of the same party/mind as the President as far as appointments go - then nominations will (and should imho) be approved right up until the next election.
Judge Barrett sits on the second highest court in the land in the Court of Appeals. She has been vetted by the Senate and approved for a lifetime Federal judgeship in 2017. She is eminently qualified to sit on the Supreme Court (as was Merrick Garland, btw - he just had the bad luck of being nominated by a lame duck President without the support of the Senate) The Supreme Court has around 7,000 cases sent to them for review annually. They actually hear and rule on 100 - 150 of these. That means that @6,900 go back to the lower court, which in a lot of these cases is the Court of Appeals - where Judge Barrett has a seat. The Court of Appeals makes many, many more rulings than the Supremes with the same power of law.
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