Democrats in 2016 demanded Senate Republicans "do their job" and give a hearing and vote to President Barack Obama's Supreme Court nominee Merrick Garland, in spite of it being a presidential election year.
Obama, then-vice president Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton, then-Senate minority leader Harry Reid (D., Nev.) and Senate Democrats ripped Republicans, who were in control of the Senate, for their decision not to consider Garland. Sen. Patrick Leahy (D., Vt.) said the Senate had approved judges as late as "September" in election years, and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I., Vt.) said the notion that Obama could not nominate a judge that year was "absurd."
Now the situation has reversed, as Democrats insist President Donald Trump and Senate Republicans not move on the vacancy left by the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
Trump has already announced he will soon nominate a justice, and Sen. Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.), who remains majority leader, said the chamber will consider the nomination immediately. McConnell said last year that if a Supreme Court vacancy came up in 2020 that he would fill it.
If Trump's pick to replace Ginsburg is confirmed, he will be the first president since Ronald Reagan to appoint three justices to the Supreme Court.