In the US Supreme Court battle to come, here are the Senators to closely watch

The death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has touched off a partisan brawl in the Senate to confirm President Donald Trump’s nominee to replace her, a vote that Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the majority leader, has vowed to hold.

With Democrats all but certain to unite in opposition to Trump’s nominee — or at least the effort to consider one so close to the presidential election — McConnell can afford few defections on his side. Republicans hold a 53-47 majority in the Senate, meaning they can lose only three votes, with Vice President Mike Pence breaking a 50-50 tie, and still confirm Trump’s nominee.

Here are four Republicans being closely watched as possible defectors.

Susan Collins of Maine

Collins, the lone New England Republican remaining in Congress and one of her party’s most politically endangered members, has been a pivotal swing vote in filling vacancies on the Supreme Court, and all eyes are on her in the battle to come.

She is one of two Republican senators who support abortion rights and has said she would not vote to confirm a nominee who would strike down the landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade case establishing a constitutional right to abortion.

Read: Amid mourning for Ginsburg, fierce battle over US Supreme Court looms

Collins, who is trying to defend her reputation as a moderate Republican in the toughest race of her political career, recently said she would not be comfortable moving to fill a Supreme Court vacancy in October, just weeks before a general election. Opposing a drive by Trump to swiftly install a successor to Ginsburg could be a powerful way for her to repair her reputation with moderate voters who turned against her after her vote in 2018 to confirm Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court.

But it could also further energize Democratic activists bent on ousting her. Sara Gideon, her Democratic opponent, has already received millions of dollars raised based on Collins’ support for Kavanaugh, and after Ginsburg’s death, progressive groups were gearing up to pour more money into targeting voters there.

Lisa Murkowski of Alaska

Murkowski was the lone Republican to oppose the confirmation of Kavanaugh in 2018. Like Collins, she is one of the few remaining Republicans on Capitol Hill who supports abortion rights and has shown a willingness to break with her party in the past.

She made no mention of how she believed the vacancy should be handled in a statement issued Saturday. But hours before the announcement of Ginsburg’s death, Murkowski told an Alaska radio station that she would not vote to confirm a Supreme Court nominee before Election Day.

“We are 50 some days away from an election,” she said.

Murkowski is not up for reelection until 2022, so she will not face the immediate electoral judgment of voters as other senators, including Collins, will.

Also Read: How Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg's death could reshape the presidential campaign

Mitt Romney of Utah

Romney had not yet been elected to Congress when the fight to confirm Kavanaugh became a partisan brawl in the Senate. But he, like Murkowski and Collins, has shown a willingness to break with the administration and the Republican Party.

Most notably, Romney became the first senator in US history to vote to remove a president of his own party from office during an impeachment trial — and the only Republican to vote to remove Trump.

Like other Republicans being watched closely for their position on Trump’s nominee and the timing of any vote, he made no mention of his position in a statement and instead focused on paying tribute to Ginsburg. And Friday night, as speculation raged that he had already decided he would not vote on a successor until after Inauguration Day in 2021, a spokeswoman called the reports “grossly false.”

Charles Grassley of Iowa

Grassley, who led the Judiciary Committee in 2016, has said that he would not conduct Supreme Court confirmation hearings in a presidential election year, particularly given the Republican blockade of Merrick Garland, President Barack Obama’s pick to replace Justice Antonin Scalia.

But Grassley no longer oversees the committee. He gave no hint of his intentions in a statement after news of Ginsburg’s death, praising her “sharp legal mind, tenacity and resilience.”