Fund to Unseat Susan Collins in 2020 Climbs to $500,000 as Leaked Doc Offers New Evidence Kavanaugh Clear Threat to Roe v. Wade

Demanding that Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) face consequences should she vote to confirm anti-choice extremist Judge Brett Kavanaugh for a lifetime appointment to the U.S. Supreme Court, healthcare activist Ady Barkan has successfully raised more than $500,000 for whomever challenges the four-term senator in 2020, should she vote for approval.

About $250,000 of those funds have poured in since Kavanaugh’s confirmation hearing began on Tuesday, as Americans have watched President Donald Trump’s nominee dodge straightforward questions about women’s right to abortion care, and Senate Republicans dismiss Democrats’ objections to the hearing just hours after 42,000 pages of documents about Kavanaugh’s career were released.

“This nomination is about more than just a position on the Supreme Court,” Barkan said in a statement. “It is about the future of this country. I believe in a future in which we can all be free. That’s why I am calling on each Senator to Be a Hero and #CancelKavanaugh.”

Barkan began his “Be A Hero” campaign fundraiser after Kavanaugh’s nomination was announced in July, asking Americans to pledge $20.20 to go to Collins’s challenger, should she vote for the judge. Should she vote no, the funds would be returned to the millions of Americans who have donated.

After Monday’s document dump, containing records of Kavanaugh’s time working the George W. Bush administration, Barkan asked supporters for a total of $42,000—a request that was easily reached within 24 hours.

“We overwhelmingly tripled that request. The funds keep pouring in mostly from the residents of Maine,” Barkan said.

Mainers have aggressively targeted Collins since the nomination was announced, as they did last summer when her vote was desperately needed by Americans who count on the Affordable Care Act (ACA) for health insurance coverage, with the Republicans threatening to repeal the law.

Collins identifies herself as a “moderate” Republican, claiming to be pro-choice despite the fact that she voted for Trump’s first Supreme Court nominee, anti-choice Justice Neil Gorsuch, last year as well as a number of other anti-choice judges.

Collins has not stated definitively how she will vote on Kavanaugh, but said after meeting with him in August that he saw Roe vs. Wade as “settled law”—a statement he has echoed numerous times in his hearings as he’s attempted to deflect concerns that he could be the deciding vote in overturning the landmark case, should one of 13 abortion rights cases currently stalled in federal appeals courts make it to the high court.