Claire McCaskill, the Democratic senator from Missouri, is wavering on whether to support President Donald Trump’s Supreme Court nominee, Neil Gorsuch, who is up for a vote on April 7. In a closed-door meeting with party donors, she said that there “is enough in his record that gives me pause…so I am very comfortable voting against him,” and acknowledged that many of her supporters wanted to fight his nomination because the Republicans refused to consider President Barack Obama’s nominee, Merrick Garland. But McCaskill also admitted she’s “uncomfortable” that, by filibustering Gorsuch, she would be “part of a strategy that’s going to open up the Supreme Court to a complete change.”

The “change” she refers to is the so-called nuclear option: A change in Senate rules to require only a 51-vote majority, rather than a 60-vote supermajority, for the confirmation of Supreme Court nominees. If the Republican majority deploys that option, Democrats won’t have any tools to resist future Court picks under Trump.

“So they move it to 51 votes and they confirm either Gorsuch or they confirm the one after Gorsuch,” McCaskill argued. “They go on the Supreme Court and then, God forbid, Ruth Bader Ginsburg dies, or (Anthony) Kennedy retires or (Stephen) Breyer has a stroke or is no longer able to serve. Then we’re not talking about Scalia for Scalia, which is what Gorsuch is, we’re talking about Scalia for somebody on the court who shares our values. And then all of a sudden, the things I fought for with scars on my back to show for it in this state are in jeopardy.”

McCaskill might be justifying an unpopular vote to her supporters, but the bind she describes is undeniable: Democrats have no good options when it comes to Gorsuch. They’re damned if they do confirm him, and they’re damned if they don’t. The same is true, more broadly, of Democrats minority power, such as it is. While some consider Republicans’ dogged obstructionism under Obama to be a proven, effective model for Democrats in the Trump era, this overlooks an essential difference between the two party’s agenda: Conservatives, per their name, have a much easier time saying “no.” An escalation of partisan warfare in Washington would have serious, long-term consequences for both parties, of course. But Democrats’ progressive agenda would suffer much more for it.

When Senate Republicans blocked Garland’s nomination last year—refusing even to allow hearings, let alone an up-or-down vote—they argued that Obama was a “lame duck president” and therefore shouldn’t have the power to replace the late Justice Antonin Scalia. “The American people are perfectly capable of having their say on this issue, so let’s give them a voice,” Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said on March 16, the day Garland was nominated—and nearly eight months before the presidential election. “Let’s let the American people decide. The Senate will appropriately revisit the matter when it considers the qualifications of the nominee the next president nominates, whoever that might be.”

