There are only four senators left who appear undecided about Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh.
The Senate Judiciary Committee is planning to vote on Kavanaugh’s confirmation Friday afternoon, just one day after Dr. Christine Blasey Ford testified that he sexually assaulted her at a party when the two were in high school. The vote will then head to the full Senate and could be as soon as Tuesday.
Republicans need only 50 votes in order to confirm Kavanaugh, as Vice President Mike Pence can cast the tie-breaking vote in his favor.
Currently, 48 Republicans have said they will vote for Kavanaugh. That means they only need two more votes.
The full list of senators who have publicly said which way they will vote are:
- Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK)
- Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME)
- Sen. Heidi Heitkamp (D-ND)
- Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV)
As of Friday morning, only two Republican senators are believed to have not yet made up their mind about Kavanaugh: Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) and Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME).
Murkowski and Collins are the two senators known for deviating from the Republican party last summer and saving the Affordable Care Act.
Sen. Jeff Flake (R-AZ), who previously said he was undecided on Kavanaugh, announced he will vote for the nominee on Friday. Flake has painted himself as a fierce Trump critic but has voted with the president’s position a majority of the time.
The two Democratic senators on the list — Heitkamp and Manchin — all represent red states and are facing reelection this November.
On Thursday, the Senate Judiciary Committee heard from Ford, who goes by Dr. Blasey professionally. She said that Kavanaugh groped her and tried to take off her clothes during a small gathering when the two were in high school. The other person she said was in the room — Kavanaugh’s friend, Mark Judge — has not been willing to testify about the alleged incident, choosing to avoid Washington, D.C. altogether and go to his beach house in Delaware instead. On Friday morning, the Senate Judiciary Committee refused to subpoena him to force him to do testify about the incident.
Two other women have also come forward to say Kavanaugh sexually assaulted them. Deborah Ramirez told The New Yorker that Kavanaugh “thrust his penis in her face, and caused her to touch it without her consent as she pushed him away” at a dormitory party when the two were students at Yale University. Three days after that report, Julie Swetnick said Kavanaugh — along with his friend Mark Judge — were allegedly involved in sexual assaults and gang rape and that Kavanaugh was present at the time of her own gang rape in the 1980s. Both women have offered to testify before the Senate but have not been given the chance to do so.
Kavanaugh has denied all the allegations against him.
UPDATE: Sen. Jeff Flake (R-AZ) announced on Friday that he will not vote for Kavanaugh in the floor vote unless the FBI investigates the sexual assault allegations made against Kavanaugh. He also suggested that there are others in the Republican caucus who agree with him.
Flake, who sits on the Senate Judiciary Committee, voted to advance Kavanaugh’s nomination to the Senate floor, however.
This piece was updated to remove Sen. Joe Donnelly (D-IN) from the list. He announced on Friday morning that he will not vote for Kavanaugh.