Nearly two months after the sudden passing of Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, establishment Republican kingpin and U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell remains steadfast in his resistance to taking any action on confirming federal judge Merrick Garland, Barack Obama’s nominee to replace Justice Scalia. What’s more, U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles Grassley, another Washington GOP insider, has so far not backed down from his refusal to hold hearings on the Garland nomination. However, at the same time that organized grassroots conservative opposition to Garland is keeping McConnell and Grassley’s feet to the fire, a number of jittery rank-and-file U.S. Senate RINOs (Republicans-in-name-only) up for reelection in November are letting news media hand wringing and left-wing special interest pressure get the better of them.

According to an April 4 report in the Wall Street Journal, Senator John Boozman (RINO-Arkansas) held a “courtesy meeting” with Judge Garland on April 5 and Senator Kelly Ayotte (RINO-New Hampshire) plans to hold a similar meeting this week. The report also outlined the shifting stance of Senator Jerry Moran (RINO-Kansas), who at first called for a Senate hearing and a vote on the Garland nomination and then retreated when the tea party threatened to recruit a candidate to oppose him in the Kansas primary this summer. Republicans are notoriously shy about calling each other out in public, but that didn’t stop Kansas Representative (and real-deal conservative) Mike Pompeo from issuing what the Wall Street Journal reporters described as -“lukewarm praise” for Moran’s flip-flop. Representative Pompeo’s comments can just as easily be described as “damning with faint praise.” Moran flip-flopped once, and conservatives in Kansas should beware of further contortions from their RINO U.S. Senator.

The fact that these three RINOs have broken ranks with Republican Senate leadership on the Garland nomination may not seem like a big deal. After all, the act of meeting with Judge Garland does not necessarily mean these senators support confirming his Supreme Court nomination. And McConnell and Grassley are holding firm. But to ignore the apparent RINO defectors is to ignore the entire Charles Schumer-Harry Reid strategy of divide and conquer. For one thing, Boozman, Ayotte and Moran aren’t the only ones to give in. FedUp PAC reported last month that liberal GOP senators Mark Kirk and Dean Heller were the first to call for hearings on Garland’s nomination. The cracks in the foundation of Republican opposition to Garland are already exposed.

Schumer and Reid are working to make those cracks wider. They will exploit the unusually large number of GOP Senate incumbents up for reelection, painting them as “extremists” for refusing to even meet with Garland. As Schumer and Reid well know, that’s normally an effective tactic to bring a RINO to heel. Establishment editorial writers and bloggers plus paid advertising by left-wing groups are echoing the Democrat party line. The goal is to generate a GOP insurrection that will force McConnell and Grassley to surrender.

With the July Republican presidential convention bearing down, it would be easy for grassroots conservatives to overlook the coming showdown over the Garland nomination. FedUp PAC urges its friends and supporters to remember what is at stake: Merrick Garland is a wolf in sheep’s clothing. Garland doesn’t come across as a hardened left-wing activist jurist like Obama’s other Supreme Court nominees, but if confirmed, Garland would serve to lock in a five-justice left-wing majority on the Supreme Court for years. The chilling consequences of that outcome are almost impossible to imagine. If you live in a state where a Republican senator is up for reelection, do your part to keep the heat on. Communicate to that senator in any way you can – personal letter, phone call, e-mail, fax or even a personal visit – that no Supreme Court justice nomination from Obama should ever see the light of day. Any Republican U.S. senator on the ballot in November would be foolish not to listen. Opposition to the Garland nomination still has the upper hand. Let’s keep it that way.