Sen. Susan Collins at a 2011 news conference in Washington, DC. Alex Wong/Getty Images 
 
 Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine was caught on a hot mic Tuesday calling Republican Rep. Blake Farenthold of Texas "unattractive" during a legislative session Tuesday morning. 
 
 Last week, Farenthold singled out "female senators from the Northeast" as being responsible for hampering the Senate's effort to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, the healthcare law better known as Obamacare. 
 
 Collins, along with Republican Sens. Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, has opposed the Senate's proposed healthcare overhaul. 
 
 Farenthold said "if it was a guy from south Texas" opposing the legislation, "I might ask him to step outside and settle this Aaron Burr-style." 
 
 Collins mentioned Farenthold's comments Tuesday morning while speaking with a male senator during a subcommittee hearing. 
 
 "Did you see the one who challenged me to a duel?" Collins asked her colleague. 
 
 "I know," he replied. "Trust me — you know why he challenged you to a duel? Because you could beat the s--- out of him." 
 
 Collins laughed and added, "He is so unattractive, it's unbelievable." 
 
 She later asked her colleague, "Did you see the picture of him in his pajamas next to this bunny?" before the microphone cut off. 
 
 Collins was most likely referring to this photo: 
 
 The other senator wasn't immediately identified, but many reporters on Twitter speculated it was Sen. Jack Reed, the ranking Democratic member of the subcommittee. ||||| Sens. Susan Collins of Maine, second from left, and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska flank President Donald Trump as he meets with Senate Republicans on the GOP health care bill in June. (Alex Wong/Getty Images file photo) 
 
 Sens. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Susan Collins of Maine withstood withering criticism — including a rhetorical challenge to a duel and a threat from the White House — to set the stage for the dramatic last-minute health care vote early Friday morning. 
 
 In the end, though, it was Arizona Sen. John McCain — returning to Washington during treatment for brain cancer diagnosis — who got the spotlight. 
 
 Murkowksi and Collins were the “two other Republicans” McCain joined in a late-night stand against the rest of their party, according to one account in The Washington Post. 
 
 It was a familiar pattern that did not go unnoticed by at least one of their female colleagues. As Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer heaped praise on McCain, calling him, “a war hero,” who, “had courage and does the right thing,” Sen. Amy Klobuchar noticed the oversight. 
 
 “Can you also not forget the two women senators who were there from the beginning?” the Minnesota Democrat said. 
 
 Schumer got the hint: He commended both women at a press conference later Friday. “They were amazing,” he said. “Women are in so many instances stronger than men.” 
 
 Murkowski and Collins, both moderates, were frequent critics of the legislation's planned cuts to Medicaid and Planned Parenthood. They also called out their colleagues’ lack of transparency throughout the process. Their positions incited backlash and outright hostility from members of their own party. 
 
 Texas Rep. Blake Farenthold hinted that if they were men he would challenge them to a duel. 
 
 On a Texas radio show, the Republican congressman said that if one of the bill’s opponents had been a “guy from south Texas, I might ask him to step outside and settle this Aaron Burr-style.” (It was a reference to an 1804 duel in which Burr, the sitting vice president, killed Alexander Hamilton, the founding Treasury secretary.) 
 
 Collins got some retribution, inadvertently, when she was caught on a hot mic disparaging Farenthold’s appearance. The two later apologized to each other. 
 
 Meanwhile, President Donald Trump singled out Murkowski on Twitter on Wednesday, a day after her ‘no’ vote on a procedural motion to open debate on the GOP health care bill. 
 
 Senator @lisamurkowski of the Great State of Alaska really let the Republicans, and our country, down yesterday. Too bad! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 26, 2017 
 
 Both Murkowski and fellow Alaska Sen. Dan Sullivan said Thursday they each received a phone call from Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke threatening repercussions for Alaska because of Murkowski’s vote. 
 
 Collins told CNN she had not heard from the White House about her vote. 
 
 The top Democrats on the Energy and Commerce and Natural Resources committees are asking the General Accountability Office to investigate Zinke’s actions — including the phone calls — to influence the health care debate. Democrats called his actions a part of “an apparent pattern and organized effort within the Trump Administration involving the use of federal resources to advance partisan legislation.” 
 
 Murkowski was unruffled. 
 
 In a move widely interpreted as a rebuke to the White House, the Energy and Natural Resources Committee she chairs, which oversees Zinke’s department, postponed a vote Thursday to nominate six Trump appointments, including three for the Interior Department. 
 
 Lisa Murkowski is the top authorizer AND the top appropriator for the Department of the Interior. — Niels Lesniewski (@nielslesniewski) July 27, 2017 
 
 A committee spokesperson told The Washington Times that the delay was “due to uncertainty of the Senate schedule.” 
 
 Lindsey McPherson, Bridget Bowman and Jeremy Dillon contributed to this report.
– "I don't mean to be unkind, but he's so unattractive it's unbelievable," Republican Sen. Susan Collins said Tuesday. Collins was caught on a hot mic discussing Republican Rep. Blake Farenthold after a Senate subcommittee hearing. Last week, Farenthold blamed "female senators" for defeating the GOP health care bill, Business Insider reports. Farenthold said that if they were men, he'd challenge them to a duel. According to the Hill, Collins has been one of the most outspoken Republican opponents of the bill. On Tuesday's hot mic, which Collins had failed to turn off, she called Farenthold "huge" and referenced a photo of him in his pajamas posing with a Playboy bunny. Democratic Sen. Jack Reed was caught on the mic telling Collins she "could beat the s--- out of" Farenthold. The hot mic also caught Collins and Reed discussing the upcoming budget battle and the unpreparedness of President Trump, the Washington Post reports. Collins said she's "worried" about Trump and the possibility the government will be "paralyzed" when no budget deal can be reached. "I think he's crazy," Reed said, apparently about Trump, adding, "I don't say that lightly." Collins called the Trump administration's handling of the federal budget "incredibly irresponsible." She said it seems like whenever the budget includes the word "grant," the administration would "just X it out with no measurement, no thinking about it, no metrics, no nothing."