Susan Rice’s meeting with Senators McCain, Graham and Ayotte yesterday might have set back her potential secretary of state bid even more than initially thought. Now Graham and Ayotte are promising to place a “hold” on her possible nomination, until Rice provides more answers:

If President Barack Obama selects United Nations envoy Susan Rice to replace Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, he’ll face determined opposition from at least three Republican senators: John McCain of Arizona, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire. Ayotte and Graham would each place a “hold” on Rice’s nomination if she were nominated, their aides told NBC News Tuesday. McCain’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

With the fiscal cliff debate heating up, a nomination filibuster probably isn’t something the Republican leadership wants to sink much political capital into. But this is an important fight for a few reasons. First, if reports from yesterday’s meeting are accurate, then the administration cherry-picked intelligence to support a narrative that, at best, they suspected might be inaccurate and, at worst, they knew was misleading. If that’s the case, McCain, Graham and Ayotte aren’t aiming for Rice, they’re aiming above her. If she’s nominated, it will give them a way to both keep the Benghazi controversy in the news and uncover more information about it.

Rice is attending another meeting with Senators Collins and Corker today. Their impressions after could help decide how far Republicans take this issue.