Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s Death Sets Off Battle Over Court Vacancy

[Follow our live coverage of Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s death]

The Supreme Court vacancy has abruptly transformed the presidential campaign.

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A vigil on Friday night outside the Supreme Court after the news of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s death.Credit...Anna Moneymaker for The New York Times

The death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on Friday instantly upended the nation’s politics in the middle of an already bitter campaign, giving President Trump an opportunity to try to install a third member of the Supreme Court with just weeks before an election that polls show he is currently losing.

The White House had already made quiet preparations in the days before Justice Ginsburg’s death to advance a nominee without waiting for voters to decide whether to give Mr. Trump another four years in the White House. Senator Mitch McConnell, the Republican leader, vowed Friday night to hold a vote on a Trump nominee but would not say whether he would try to rush it through before the Nov. 3 vote in what would surely be a titanic partisan battle.

The sudden vacancy on the court abruptly transformed the presidential campaign and underscored the stakes of the contest between Mr. Trump and former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., his Democratic challenger. It also bolstered Mr. Trump’s effort to shift the subject away from his handling of the coronavirus pandemic and remind Republicans why it matters whether he wins, while also potentially galvanizing Democrats who fear a change in the balance of power on the Supreme Court.

If Mr. Trump is able to replace Justice Ginsburg, a liberal icon, it could cement a conservative majority for years to come, giving Republican appointees six of the nine seats. While Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. lately has sided at times with the four liberals on issues like immigration, gay rights and health care, he would no longer be the swing vote on a court with another Trump appointee.

No one understood the broader political consequences of her death better than Justice Ginsburg, who battled through one ailment after another in hopes of hanging onto her seat until after the election. Just days before her death, NPR reported, she dictated this statement to her granddaughter, Clara Spera: “My most fervent wish is that I will not be replaced until a new president is installed.”

Biden says ‘voters should pick the president, and the president should pick the justice.’

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Biden Says Ginsburg Was ‘a Giant’ and ‘a Beloved Figure’

Joseph R. Biden Jr., the Democratic nominee for president, said Justice Ginsburg’s Supreme Court seat should not be filled until after the election.

We learned of the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who is not only a giant in the legal profession but a beloved figure. And my heart goes out to all those who cared for her and care about her. Her opinions and her dissent are going to continue to shape the basis for law for a generation. You know, tonight, and in the coming days, we should focus on the loss of the justice and her enduring legacy. But there is no doubt, let me be clear, that the voters should pick the president, and the president should pick the justice for the Senate to consider. This was the position the Republican Senate took in 2016 when there were almost 10 months to go before the election. That’s the position the United States Senate must take today. And the election is only 46 days off. I think the fastest justice ever confirmed was 47 days, and the average is closer to 70 days. And so they should do this with full consideration, and that is my hope and expectation what will happen.

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Joseph R. Biden Jr., the Democratic nominee for president, said Justice Ginsburg’s Supreme Court seat should not be filled until after the election.CreditCredit...Erin Schaff/The New York Times

Joseph R. Biden Jr. said on Friday night that the Supreme Court vacancy created by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s death should not be filled until after the presidential election.

“There is no doubt — let me be clear — that the voters should pick the president, and the president should pick the justice for the Senate to consider,” he told reporters after landing at New Castle Airport in Delaware following a campaign trip to Minnesota.

Mr. Biden, the former vice president, pointed to how Senate Republicans refused to consider the nomination of Judge Merrick B. Garland in the final year of President Barack Obama’s second term.

“This was the position the Republican Senate took in 2016 when there were almost 10 months to go before the election,” Mr. Biden said. “That’s the position the United States Senate must take today.”

The statement by Mr. Biden, who spent 36 years in the Senate and served as chairman of the Judiciary Committee, immediately put him at odds with Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the majority leader, who said a nominee by President Trump “will receive a vote” in the Senate.

Senator Kamala Harris of California, Mr. Biden’s running mate, also issued a statement: “Even as we focus on the life that she led and process tonight’s grief, her legacy and the future of the court to which she dedicated so much can’t disappear from our effort to honor her,” she said of Justice Ginsburg. “In some of her final moments with her family, she shared her fervent wish to ‘not be replaced until a new president is installed.’ We will honor that wish.”

Mr. Biden has previously promised to nominate a Black woman to the Supreme Court. Ms. Harris, in an Instagram Live conversation on Friday, said that doing so would be a priority for a Biden-Harris administration.

On Friday night, Mr. Trump did not address his plans for the Supreme Court in brief remarks to reporters before boarding Air Force One to return to Washington, after a rally in Minnesota.

“She led an amazing life,” he said. “What else can you say? She was an amazing woman. Whether you agreed or not, she was an amazing woman who led an amazing life.”

In his comments to reporters, Mr. Biden also spoke of Justice Ginsburg’s life and career, noting that he had presided over her confirmation hearings in 1993. He said she was “not only a giant in the legal profession, but a beloved figure.”

“She practiced the highest American ideals as a justice, equality and justice under the law, and Ruth Bader Ginsburg stood for all of us,” he said.

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Grief and tributes for Ginsburg as mourners gather outside the Supreme Court.

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People gathered outside the Supreme Court building after the announcement of the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on Friday.Credit...Anna Moneymaker for The New York Times

Scores of people filled the steps leading up to the Supreme Court in Washington on Friday night, crowding the plaza outside and spilling across the street in a candlelight tribute to Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

Many said that it was a solemn celebration of Justice Ginsburg’s legacy in shaping American jurisprudence, and that it should not be corrupted by the political fights bound to flare up in the Capitol in the days to come.

“We, as citizens, have a responsibility to mourn her, and stand together and show that we care about human life, which is something I think we’ve lost in the last six months,” said David Means, who was quietly discussing the justice’s legacy in the court’s plaza. “We need to be here — this is the place to be for anyone who believes in American ideals and progress in this country.”

Mourners began arriving at the court after dusk. At first, those gathered were so quiet that splashes from nearby fountains were audible across the plaza. But soon crowds swelled, filling the courthouse stairs, singing “Amazing Grace” and discussing the effects Justice Ginsburg had on the law.

Nearly all appeared to be wearing masks to protect themselves from the coronavirus, but social distancing was less observed, with many standing nearly shoulder to shoulder.

Becca Ebert of Seattle, who moved to Washington for a dual-degree program at Georgetown University, credited Justice Ginsburg with opening doors for women. “I know that I can go to law school because of a lot of the work that she did,” she said.

Others celebrated Justice Ginsburg’s role in landmark rulings on matters like gay marriage.

“As a proud L.G.B.T.Q.I.A. Hispanic male, it transcends so many different levels, in my community, in the community I was raised up in El Paso, Texas — it absolutely means so much, the work that she did,” said Richard Cerros of Washington.

The news also led to an outpouring among lawmakers.

“Ruthie was my friend and I will miss her terribly,” Senator Elizabeth Warren, Democrat of Massachusetts and a former presidential candidate, said on Twitter.

“As a young mom heading off to Rutgers law school, I saw so few examples of female lawyers or law professors,” she added. “But Ruthie blazed the trail. I’m forever grateful for her example — to me, and to millions of young women who saw her as a role model.”

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said the loss was “devastating.”

“Every family in America benefited from her brilliant legacy and courage,” she added in a statement. “Her opinions have unequivocally cemented the precedent that all men and women are created equal.”

Hillary Clinton, the first woman to be a major-party candidate for president, said that “Justice Ginsburg paved the way for so many women, including me.”

“There will never be another like her,” she added.

Many tributes to Justice Ginsburg looked to the future. “Now is not the time for cynicism or hopelessness,” Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Democrat of New York, said on Twitter. “There is and continues to be political possibility to preserve our democracy & move forward.”

McConnell says Trump’s nominee to replace Ginsburg ‘will receive a vote’ in the Senate.

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Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said he would move forward with President Trump’s nominee to replace Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the Supreme Court.Credit...Michael A. McCoy for The New York Times

The Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, said late Friday that he would move forward with President Trump’s nominee to replace Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the Supreme Court.

“Americans re-elected our majority in 2016 and expanded it in 2018 because we pledged to work with President Trump and support his agenda, particularly his outstanding appointments to the federal judiciary,” Mr. McConnell said in a statement. “Once again, we will keep our promise. President Trump’s nominee will receive a vote on the floor of the United States Senate.”

Mr. McConnell was notably unclear, however, about the timing, whether he would push for such a vote before the election or wait until a lame-duck session afterward. Several of his members face tough election contests and might balk at appearing to rush a nominee through in such highly political conditions.

There was immediate reaction from a few Republican senators calling for a quick confirmation and vote before Election Day.

“I believe that the president should next week nominate a successor to the court, and I think it is critical that the Senate takes up and confirms that successor before Election Day,” Senator Ted Cruz of Texas said in an interview on Fox News. “This nomination is why Donald Trump was elected.”

Senators Martha McSally of Arizona and Kelly Loeffler of Georgia, two of the most endangered Republican senators facing re-election, each posted statements to Twitter calling for the Senate to vote on Justice Ginsburg’s replacement.

Still, stunned Republicans expressed initial skepticism on Friday night that Mr. McConnell would find enough votes to confirm a new justice in the weeks before the election. And some of them thought Mr. McConnell would also be unable to do so in a lame-duck session if Republicans lose the White House and control of the Senate.

Two former Senate Republican leadership aides close to Mr. McConnell read the concluding sentence of his statement — “President Trump’s nominee will receive a vote on the floor of the United States Senate” — to mean that he was not committed to pushing through the confirmation before the election and may wait until the lame-duck session.

Privately, some party strategists warned that if Democrats won the presidency and the Senate and Republicans seated a new justice before Joseph R. Biden Jr. and the new Senators were sworn in, Democrats would exact retribution by ending the filibuster and moving to pack the Supreme Court.

Democrats, for their part, moved swiftly to warn Republicans against a hasty confirmation process — echoing Mr. McConnell’s own comments from 2016.

“While no one will ever truly be able to replace Justice Ginsburg, a new president should fill the vacancy,” said Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, a member of the Judiciary Committee. “Just like Mitch McConnell said.”

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A few moderate Republicans will play key roles in the Court battle.

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Senator Susan Collins of Maine said this month that she would not favor voting on a new justice in October.Credit...Anna Moneymaker for The New York Times

All eyes turned to the Senate’s more moderate Republicans on Saturday after Mitch McConnell, the majority leader, said late Friday that he would move ahead with a nominee from President Trump to replace Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the Supreme Court.

The more moderate Republican Senators are a small group, and it is not clear whether they could control enough votes to block Mr. Trump’s nominee. Republicans have 53 votes in the Senate to the Democrats’ 47, and Vice President Mike Pence is allowed to break any ties.

Among the Republican members who hold the crucial votes are Susan Collins of Maine, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Mitt Romney of Utah.

Ms. Collins, who is facing a close re-election contest, told The New York Times this month that she would not favor voting on a new justice in October. “I think that’s too close,” she said.

She is already dealing with political fallout from voting for Justice Brett Kavanaugh in 2018 as he faced sexual assault accusations. Among likely voters in Maine, 55 percent said in a recent poll that they disapproved of that vote, compared with 38 percent who supported it.

Ms. Murkowski told Alaska Public Media, in an interview on Friday shortly before the announcement of Justice Ginsburg’s death, that she also opposed confirming a new justice before the election. But a statement she released Friday night about Justice Ginsburg’s death made no mention of her position on appointing a replacement.

Mr. Romney has stayed silent on the question of Justice Ginsburg’s successor. The lone Republican who voted to convict Mr. Trump during an impeachment vote this year, he released a statement that praised her legacy but did not weigh in on her replacement. A spokeswoman for Mr. Romney denied a claim by a Utah politician on Twitter that Mr. Romney would not confirm a nominee until after the inauguration next year.

Were those three Senators to vote against Mr. Trump’s nominee, only for Mr. Pence to push through the nominee by casting a tiebreaking vote, analysts said it would provoke a constitutional crisis. It would also add considerable pressure on Senate Democrats to support ending the filibuster and moving to pack the Supreme Court.

Democrats moved swiftly to warn against a hasty confirmation process — echoing Mr. McConnell’s own comments as he blocked President Barack Obama’s nomination of Merrick Garland in 2016.

“While no one will ever truly be able to replace Justice Ginsburg, a new president should fill the vacancy,” said Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, a member of the Judiciary Committee. “Just like Mitch McConnell said.”

Trump calls Ginsburg a ‘titan of the law’ and a ‘fighter to the end.’

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Trump Calls Ginsburg ‘an Amazing Woman’

President Trump spoke about the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg after leaving the stage of a rally in Minnesota.

She just died? Wow. I didn’t know that. I just — you’re telling me now for the first time. She led an amazing life. What else can you say? She was an amazing woman. Whether you agreed or not, she was an amazing woman who led an amazing life. I’m actually saddened to hear that. I am saddened to hear that. Thank you very much. [Song on loudspeaker: “Tiny Dancer”]

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President Trump spoke about the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg after leaving the stage of a rally in Minnesota.CreditCredit...Doug Mills/The New York Times

President Trump called Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg a “titan of the law” and a “fighter to the end” in a statement issued hours after her death on Friday.

“Today, our nation mourns the loss of a titan of the law,” Mr. Trump said in the statement, which was posted on his Twitter account late on Friday evening.

“Renowned for her brilliant mind and her powerful dissents at the Supreme Court, Justice Ginsburg demonstrated that one can disagree without being disagreeable toward one’s colleagues or different points of view,” Mr. Trump said. “Her opinions, including well-known decisions regarding the legal equality of women and the disabled, have inspired all Americans, and generations of great legal minds.”

The president also called Justice Ginsburg a “fighter to the end” who had battled cancer “and other very long odds throughout her remarkable life.”

Earlier Friday, Mr. Trump had reacted with surprise as he learned of Justice Ginsburg’s death as he left a stage in Bemidji, Minn., where he had delivered a lengthy campaign speech.

“She just died? I didn’t know that,” Mr. Trump said, speaking briefly to reporters before boarding Air Force One to return to Washington. “She led an amazing life. What else can you say? She was an amazing woman. Whether you agreed or not, she was an amazing woman who led an amazing life.”

During his speech, in an airport hangar, Mr. Trump had clearly appeared to be unaware of the potentially seismic shift to the balance of the Supreme Court that occurred while he was onstage, as he launched sexist attacks against Hillary Clinton and stoked fears of a flood of Islamic terrorists that he said would occur if Joseph R. Biden Jr. were elected.

News that Justice Ginsburg had died of metastatic pancreatic cancer on Friday broke about 15 minutes after Mr. Trump took the stage.

In the speech, Mr. Trump said he wanted to appoint Senator Ted Cruz of Texas to the Supreme Court, and he later said that “one of the things we have done that is so good with the Supreme Court, we have two Supreme Court justices. We will have at the end of my term approximately 300 federal judges.”

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Ginsburg’s death raises scrutiny over a list of Supreme Court nominees Trump updated last week.

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President Trump announced his list of potential Supreme Court nominees last week at the White House.Credit...Doug Mills/The New York Times

President Trump, who counts his two Supreme Court appointments as among his greatest successes, last week issued a new list of 20 potential nominees to the court. There was no vacancy at the time, and the exercise seemed aimed at focusing attention on an issue that had helped secure his election in 2016.

With the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on Friday, the list has become the subject of intense interest.

In 2016, similar lists helped persuade wary conservatives to support his unconventional candidacy, particularly because the death of Justice Antonin Scalia that February had created a vacancy. That the new list, which included three senators and two former solicitors general, was issued when there was no vacancy suggested that the move had political aims.

Mr. Trump now has about 40 potential nominees to choose among. Before listing the new candidates last week, he singled out three judges from earlier lists who are widely believed to remain front-runners: Amy Coney Barrett of the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, in Chicago; Thomas M. Hardiman of the Third Circuit, in Philadelphia; and William H. Pryor Jr. of the 11th Circuit, in Atlanta.

The new list included three Republican senators: Tom Cotton of Arkansas, Ted Cruz of Texas and Josh Hawley of Missouri. Over the nation’s history, it was not unusual for sitting senators to be named to the Supreme Court, though it has been almost half a century since a former senator sat on the court.

The new list included lawyers who had worked at the White House and in the Justice Department, notably Noel J. Francisco, who recently stepped down as solicitor general, having defended many of Mr. Trump’s policies and programs before the justices, as well as a number of federal appeals court judges.

All of his candidates, Mr. Trump said, were judicial conservatives in the mold of Justice Scalia and two current members of the court, Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel A. Alito Jr.

Obama praises Ginsburg as ‘a warrior for gender equality.’

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Then-President Barack Obama was greeted by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg before his State of the Union address in 2016.Credit...Nicholas Kamm/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Former President Barack Obama on Friday called Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg “a warrior for gender equality” who helped Americans see the perils of gender discrimination.

As a litigator and later a jurist, “Justice Ginsburg helped us see that discrimination on the basis of sex isn’t about an abstract ideal of equality; that it doesn’t only harm women; that it has real consequences for all of us,” Mr. Obama said in a statement issued just before midnight and later published on Medium. “It’s about who we are — and who we can be.”

Mr. Obama said Justice Ginsburg had “inspired the generations who followed her, from the tiniest trick-or-treaters to law students burning the midnight oil to the most powerful leaders in the land.” The first group was an apparent reference to children who dressed up in “R.B.G.” costumes for Halloween.

Mr. Obama also weighed in on the contentious issue of when Justice Ginsburg’s successor should be nominated to the Supreme Court.

“A basic principle of the law — and of everyday fairness — is that we apply rules with consistency, and not based on what’s convenient or advantageous in the moment,” Mr. Obama, whose own nominee for the court, Judge Merrick B. Garland, was blocked by Senate Republicans, said in the statement.

”The rule of law, the legitimacy of our courts, the fundamental workings of our democracy all depend on that basic principle,” Mr. Obama added. “As votes are already being cast in this election, Republican senators are now called to apply that standard.”

Former President Bill Clinton, who nominated Justice Ginsburg to the Supreme Court in 1993, praised her on Friday as “one of the most extraordinary justices ever to serve on the Supreme Court.”

“Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s life and landmark opinions moved us closer to a more perfect union,” Mr. Clinton wrote on Twitter. “And her powerful dissents reminded us that we walk away from our Constitution’s promise at our peril.”

During Mr. Obama’s second term, Justice Ginsburg shrugged off a chorus of calls for her to retire in order to give a Democratic president the chance to name her replacement.

She planned to stay “as long as I can do the job full steam,” she would say, sometimes adding, “There will be a president after this one, and I’m hopeful that that president will be a fine president.”

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Here’s what McConnell said about Supreme Court picks in 2016.

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“This vacancy should not be filled until we have a new president,” Senator Mitch McConnell, center of frame, said of the Supreme Court in 2016.Credit...Anna Moneymaker for The New York Times

Senator Mitch McConnell said late Friday that his decision to block President Barack Obama from filling a Supreme Court vacancy about nine months before the 2016 election had not set a precedent.

After Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s death on Friday, Mr. McConnell, the Senate majority leader, said he would move forward with a Senate vote on President Trump’s nominee for the Supreme Court.

Here are some of the arguments that he made four years ago, after the death of Justice Antonin Scalia, to justify blocking Mr. Obama’s nominee, Judge Merrick B. Garland.

  • “The American people should have a voice in the selection of their next Supreme Court Justice,” he said in February 2016, about an hour after Justice Scalia’s death was confirmed. “Therefore this vacancy should not be filled until we have a new president.”

    Later that month, he said he agreed with a written vow by Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee that they would not hold confirmation hearings.

  • In March 2016, Mr. McConnell dismissed the possibility of considering Judge Garland in a lame-duck session after the November election, even if a Democrat were elected president or Republicans lost their majority.

    “That’s not going to happen,” he said. “The principle is the same. Whether it’s before the election or after the election, the principle is the American people are choosing their next president, and their next president should pick this Supreme Court nominee.”

  • In the first few months of 2016, Senate Republicans cited the “Biden rule” — drawn from a speech that Joseph R. Biden Jr., then a senator, gave in 1992 — as justification for blocking Judge Garland’s nomination. In that 1992 speech, Mr. Biden urged President George Bush not to name a Supreme Court nominee in an election year.

    “It seems the more we hear from Democrats about the Supreme Court, the more we’re reminded by comparison of how reasonable and common-sense the Republican position is today,” Mr. McConnell said in May 2016.

A Supreme Court vacancy so close to a presidential election has happened only once before.

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Ruth Bader Ginsburg in December in New York.Credit...Krista Schlueter for The New York Times

Only once before has a Supreme Court vacancy opened up closer to Election Day than the one left by Justice Ginsburg’s death on Friday. And that was more than 150 years ago.

Justice Ginsburg’s death created an opening 46 days before the presidential election —narrowly edging out the opening created by the retirement of Justice Sherman Minton in 1956, 53 days before the poll, and a fraction of the period between Justice Antonin Scalia’s death in 2016 and the election 269 days later.

The only vacancy closer to an election than the one left by Justice Ginsburg: an opening created by the death of Chief Justice Roger Taney in 1864, 27 days before the vote.

President Abraham Lincoln nominated a successor only after his re-election, choosing Salmon Chase. Mr. Chase, a champion of the antislavery movement in the Senate and governor of Ohio from 1856 to 1860, served as Treasury Secretary during the Civil War. He was nominated on December 6, 1864, and confirmed by the U.S. Senate on the same day.

In Justice Minton’s case, a replacement was nominated and approved well after the election. And while President Barack Obama nominated Merrick Garland to succeed Justice Scalia in 2016, Republicans did not hold a vote until after the election, and Mr. Garland’s nomination eventually expired.

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The winner of the Arizona Senate race could be seated in time for a vote on a Supreme Court pick.

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Mark Kelly, the Democratic nominee for Senate in Arizona, leads Senator Martha McSally, a Republican, in the polls.Credit...Mike Christy/Arizona Daily Star, via Associated Press

If Mark Kelly, the Democratic nominee for Senate in Arizona, unseats Senator Martha McSally, a Republican who was appointed to her seat and began serving last year, he could be sworn in as early as Nov. 30 — possibly in time to vote on a new Supreme Court nominee, elections experts said.

Hypothetically, that would narrow the Republicans’ 53-to-47 majority in the upper chamber, which may become relevant if a vote on a replacement for Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg was delayed until a lame-duck session after the election.

The Arizona race is technically a special election. The state’s Republican governor appointed Ms. McSally to the seat after she was defeated by Kyrsten Sinema, a Democrat, in a closely contested Senate race in 2018.

Mr. Kelly, a former astronaut and the husband of former Representative Gabrielle Giffords, has maintained a steady lead over Ms. McSally, a former military pilot. If Mr. Kelly wins, state election law stipulates a final canvass of the balloting be completed by the end of November, barring legal challenges.

On Friday, Republican and Democratic election attorneys told The Arizona Republic that such a scenario was possible — a possibility embraced on social media by progressives grappling with the dark and unnerving prospect of a high-stakes court fight with an uncertain outcome.

“Everything in statute suggests it happens very quickly after the election results are finalized,” Mary O’Grady, a Democratic election lawyer, told the paper.

Ms. McSally joined other Senate Republicans late Friday in supporting a vow by Senator Mitch McConnell, the majority leader, to force a vote on President Trump’s choice for the court. (An earlier version of this item incorrectly described Mr. McConnell as the minority leader.)

“This U.S. Senate should vote on President Trump’s next nominee for the U.S. Supreme Court,” Ms. McSally wrote on Twitter, after noting Justice Ginsburg’s achievements.

Mr. Kelly did not address the matter in a statement sent to reporters mourning Justice Ginsburg’s death.

“She fought cancer with the same ferocity she fought for civil rights and equality,” Mr. Kelly said. “I am in awe of how much Justice Ginsburg accomplished in her lifetime, leaving a legacy that impacted women’s rights and equal protection under the law for all Americans.”

Democrats shatter ActBlue’s donation records after Ginsburg’s death.

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People gathered in front of a memorial for Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg outside of the Supreme Court following news of her death on Friday.Credit...Jason Andrew for The New York Times

Democratic donors gave more money online in the 9 p.m. hour Friday after Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s death was announced — $6.2 million — than in any other single hour since ActBlue, the donation-processing site, was started 16 years ago.

Then donors broke the site’s record again in the 10 p.m. hour when donors gave another $6.3 million — more than $100,000 per minute.

The unprecedented outpouring shows the power of a looming Supreme Court confirmation fight to motivate Democratic donors. The previous biggest hour, on Aug. 20, when Joseph R. Biden Jr. spoke on the final night of the Democratic convention, saw $4.3 million in donations processed, according to an ActBlue spokesperson.

Before noon on Saturday, donations to Democratic causes and campaigns on ActBlue since Justice Ginsburg’s passing had topped $45 million.

ActBlue does not show where donations go in real time but much of the grassroots energy appeared focused on the Senate, which would have the power to confirm or block any nominee picked by President Trump.

Hours after Justice Ginsburg’s death, Senator Mitch McConnell, the majority leader, pledged that whomever Mr. Trump picked to replace her would receive a confirmation vote. “President Trump’s nominee will receive a vote on the floor of the United States Senate,” he said in a statement.

Democratic donors flooded into at least one page dedicated to key Senate races, called Get Mitch or Die Trying. The page, created by the progressive group Crooked Media, had raised about $9 million in new donations since Justice Ginsburg’s death was announced, as of noon on Saturday, and will divide the proceeds between 13 different Democrats running for Senate this year.

“The conventional wisdom is that the Supreme Court only motivates Republicans, but these fund-raising totals demonstrate that that has changed,” said Tommy Vietor, a founder of Crooked Media and a veteran of the Obama administration.

Supreme Court confirmation fights have led to big swells of donations before. The Senate hearings and votes on Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh in 2018 drove record donations into the campaign coffers of then-Senator Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota, a centrist Democrat who raised $12.4 million in the first half of October after she announced she would oppose his nomination. She was defeated in her re-election bid the next month.

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