WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) - Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh told a key Republican senator that Roe v. Wade was "settled law" in an interview ahead of confirmation hearings in Washington next month. Kavanaugh met on Tuesday with Sen. Susan Collins, a moderate Republican from Maine who supports abortion rights and a potential swing vote in a closely divided Senate. Collins told reporters that Kavanaugh agreed with a statement by Chief Justice John Roberts in 2005 during his own confirmation hearings in which he called Roe "settled as a precedent of the court." The most recent addition to the court, Neil Gorsuch, also called Roe settled law during his own hearings in 2017. Another Republican-appointed justice, Samuel Alito, declined to refer to Roe as settled law before he joined the court in 2006. Kavanaugh needs every Republican vote in the Senate, where the party holds a slim 51-49 majority. Collins had previously voted to confirm Roberts, Alito and Gorsuch.
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