But there’s a far simpler reason Republicans might ultimately decide not to take up the bill: It goes against what many white evangelicals want, and white evangelicals remain an important and influential part of the Republican Party.

Consider that evangelical institutions are already urging Republicans not to vote in favor of the bill. On July 26, 83 religious and right-wing groups sent a letter to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell saying the act “is an attack on millions of Americans, particularly people of faith, who believe marriage is between one man and one woman and that legitimate distinctions exist between men and women concerning family formation that should be recognized in the law.”

This argument, that recognizing the rights of others is an infringement on one’s own religious liberty, is a familiar one, especially in the years since the Supreme Court made same-sex marriage legal across the country in 2015. Andrew Lewis, a professor in political science at the University of Cincinnati, said that after the verdict in Obergefell v. Hodges, opponents of same-sex marriage lost the argument over whether same-sex marriage should be legal and shifted the discussion. “It’s less about the substance of marriage equality and more about what they see as the harm to dissenting opinions,” Lewis said.