Shortly after President Trump nominated Amy Coney Barrett to fill the Supreme Court’s vacancy created by the death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Senate Democrats vowed to do everything they could to prevent her confirmation. Their fear is that Republicans will shift the court’s ideological center of gravity rightward for a generation or more if they successfully replace Ginsburg, who was one of the court’s leading liberal justices, with Barrett, a conservative jurist who currently sits on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit.

Still, Democrats concede that there is little they can do in the post-filibuster Senate to stop Barrett’s confirmation. Senate watchers likewise portray Barrett’s confirmation as a foregone conclusion. And while reports initially acknowledged that Democrats have some procedural tools to slow the process, the conventional wisdom appears to be that they are powerless to stop it.