Posted on 03/12/2019 6:46:29 PM PDT by Hojczyk
WASHINGTON, DC – Senate Republicans are preparing to reinterpret Senate Rules in coming weeks to reduce the number of hours required to confirm presidential nominations, responding to Democrats’ unprecedented obstruction of President Trump’s nominees for both the judiciary and the Executive Branch.
In fact, that is what Senate Democrats are doing now. Judges are being slow-walked, with more cloture votes being required in two years for President Trump’s picks than all the judicial nominations of every previous president combined since the filibuster was created in the late 1800s. Similarly, hundreds of the 1,200 Senate-confirmed positions in the Trump administration are still vacant.
After two years of debating what to do about this unprecedented obstruction, Senate Republicans now appear to have the votes to reinterpret Senate rules to rein in this practice. It takes a two-thirds supermajority vote in the Senate (67) to change the chamber’s rules, but it only takes a simple majority (51) to reinterpret existing rules.
Under a reinterpretation proposed by Sen. James Lankford (R-OK), nominees for the Supreme Court, federal courts of appeals, the Cabinet, and certain commissions can still receive 30 hours of post-cloture debate. However, nominations for federal trial courts – called district courts – and all other administration posts will be limited to two hours.
A number of Republicans who are either moderates or who place special value on Senate traditions have been unwilling to take this step. But the mood has changed as those senators have witnessed the problem continuing to worsen, as Democrats have spurned entreaties by these Republicans’ to meet them partway.
(Excerpt) Read more at breitbart.com ...
Bet they do not do it...THe GOP is dumber than dirt..
I’ve been hearing this crap for well over a year. Color me cynical.
I guess the Democrats are proud of their obstruction.
THe GOP is dumber than dirt..
No, they are not dumb.
You assume the have the same goals and fears we do.
They do not. Many of them fear the Media much more than they fear their voters. They know the Media has a very strong ability to sway voters.
“THe GOP is dumber than dirt”
They’re not dumb. They just believe Orange Man Bad.
The way the Democrats have been applying the rules is no longer in keeping with any "traditions" - it has been total and complete obstruction for the sake of doing so. Acting in good faith was gone long ago.
The votes didn’t exist for it then with 51 seats. 53 may be a different story...fewer turn coats and more getting agitated with abuse of the rules not in keeping with the spirit of why they were set as rules to begin with.
What took them so long? God, they are weak.
No kidding. I’ll believe this when I see it.
Should be past tense, not future tense! It’s probably what is called “a trial balloon.”
They’ll get it done. They just have to get 60 votes to do it.
Read the article. They only need 51 to reinterpret the rules.
They will fold just like the spineless dick heads they are. The GOP is a bunch of lying spineless imbeciles.
Not Dumb, Complicit. It is a mistake to presume that the GOP is any more honest than the democrats, they all leave office rich and that should be obvious.
Not Dumb, Complicit. It is a mistake to presume that the GOP is any more honest than the democrats, they all leave office rich and that should be obvious.
They should get rid of the filibuster too.
I know. I was just joshing.
No, you haven’t. This is new. What you have heard is that the Senate will be in session 24/7 to force these nominations to a vote. They have done some of that, but for certain ones only.
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