Posted on 04/03/2019 1:15:59 PM PDT by jazusamo
Senate Republicans deployed the “nuclear option” on Wednesday to drastically reduce the amount of time it takes to confirm hundreds of President Trump’s nominees.
Senators voted 51-48 to change the rules for the amount of time it takes to confirm most executive nominations with only a simple majority of the chamber. GOP Sens. Mike Lee (Utah) and Susan Collins (Maine) joined with Democrats in opposing the rules change.
Republicans are expected to trigger the “nuclear option” for a second time later Wednesday to force through the same change for district court nominations.
The combined actions will result in most nominations that require Senate confirmation needing only two hours of debate after they’ve defeated a filibuster that shows they have the votes to ultimately be confirmed. Before Wednesday’s rules change they faced up to an additional 30 hours of debate.
Supreme Court picks, appeals court judges and Cabinet nominees will not be affected by the rules change and will still face the lengthier Senate floor debate.
But the move will let Republicans hit the gas on confirming nominations, a top priority in an era of divided government that has left lawmakers without big-ticket legislative agenda items.
Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) argued shortly before triggering the hardball procedural tactic that the Senate needed to go back to a “more normal and reasonable process” for confirming nominations.
“Our colleagues across the aisle have chosen to endlessly relitigate the 2016 election rather than actually participate in governing,” McConnell added. “This problem goes deeper than today. We’re talking about the future of this very institution and the future functioning of our constitutional government.
Republicans have set a record for the number of appeals judges confirmed during an administration’s first two years, but they’ve accused Democrats of using the chamber’s legislative rulebook to slow down lower-level executive and judicial nominations.
Of 715 “key positions” tracked by The Washington Post and the Partnership for Public Service, 435 have been confirmed by the Senate. An additional 131 are awaiting confirmation, 12 need to be formally nominated and 140 positions still need nominations.
And, according to the same tracker, some departments still have substantial vacancies in their Senate-confirmed positions.
The Interior Department, for example, has 41 percent of its Senate-confirmed employees in place, the Justice Department has 48 percent and the Department of Labor has 50 percent.
It’s the second time Republicans have gone “nuclear” to make it easier to confirm Trump’s nominees in as many years. In 2017, Republicans nixed the 60-vote filibuster on Supreme Court nominees, mirroring the action Democrats took in 2013 on lower-court and executive nominees.
Republicans made a last-ditch effort on Tuesday to pass the rules change as a standing order, which would have required 60 votes. But Democrats and Lee voted against the resolution, preventing it from getting the necessary support to pass.
The resolution was widely expected to fail the earlier test vote but was aimed at assuaging concerns from within the GOP caucus about moving forward with the nuclear option without at least trying to pass it with Democrats. The caucus held a meeting on Tuesday evening to walk through the plan for Wednesday.
“I think we had to convince 51, at least 51, of our members that we’re doing everything possible to try to do this through regular order,” said Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) about the point of Tuesday’s vote.
Republicans say they reached out to try to negotiate an agreement with Democrats to try to reach a deal to avoid Wednesday’s floor drama but found little interest. Sources familiar with the negotiations told The Hill last week that Democrats have tried to negotiate a deal with McConnell, with suggested changes such as postponing the rules change until 2021, applying it only to executive nominees or restoring the “blue slip” for circuit court picks but were unable to reach an agreement.
Democrats are bristling over Republicans decision to invoke the “nuclear option,” arguing that they can’t simultaneously complain about the pace of nominations while setting a record for some court nominees.
A similar resolution passed the Senate in 2013 that cut debate time for most executive nominations to eight hours and district judges to two hours. But that resolution, which passed with bipartisan support, only controlled the 113th Congress.
Democrats argue that the dynamic around nominations has changed dramatically since then. Democrats nixed the 60-vote filibuster in 2013 for most nominations and Republicans followed suite in 2017 on Supreme Court nominations.
Republicans have also moved circuit nominations over the objections of home-state senators.
“The way my colleagues on the other side talk about the issue, you’d think Democrats delayed every nominee for as long as possible. That just doesn’t remotely resemble the truth,” said Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.).
I live in Maine and did a write-in in 2014 and probably will do the same next year. We’ll see, but I can’t stand this moron Collins.
As a guy that has watched America's party of opposition in play, it is clear the next time the Dem Socialists take the Senate they will almost certainly hold the House as well - in which event we are screwed. IMO, it is beyond politics as usual.
Lee & Collins....a Mormon and a moron.
Better a "Known RINO" than a Dim... They are but PUB relics in their respective DIM States. Only their incumbency allows them to hang on!
Amen!
I really can’t say anything good about Lee’s vote- makes me question his mental stability if he’s a supposed strong conservative and can’t make an easy call like this.
"When OUR side was changing the rules, it was great! Now that THEIR side wants to do it, it's immoral and evil."
A non issue. The Rats will never again hold the White House.
“It’s the only way to be sure.”
Not even that is enough, if they want to put out a sequel.
Oh ye ever trumpers of little faith.
Good news is never good enough for the sanctimonious
Well, they never took off and nuked it, did they? I think the power plant eventually blew. You know the company manufacturers that!
Ripley was too busy fighting the Queen and I think she forgot to nuke it before going into hyper-sleep.
By the time the got the second drop-ship from the Sulaco, it was just Ripley, Bishop and Newt.
And the Queen in one of the landing skis bay.
:)
Wait, what, Romney supported this and Lee didn’t?
THAT makes me even more suspicious of these “Trump” judges. I won’t count these chickens until they hatch. Gorsuch looks solid so far. Jury is still out on Kavanaugh. We have no idea how the lower court judges will be over their careers. Too earlier to tell.
I guess Lee really doesn’t want that SCOTUS gig.
This is a good start. The Constitution calls for a simple majority and the filibuster rule, I believe, would not pass a test case with the Supremes. Especially if we get one more conservative vote.
I’m guessing Trump cut a deal. He backed off shuting down the border for this probably.
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You’ve guessed wrong. This has been in the works for some time in the Senate. McConnell has been doing it using “regular order” (worked it through the rules committee) in this Congress now that the naysayers (e.g., McCain, Flake) are gone and there are votes for it amongst the Senate Republicans.
Just 2 years late.
Constitutional option bump!
One way to defeat the corrupt deep state is to seed DC bureaucracies with lots of conservatives. Good for Mitch McConnell...
Excerpt from updated article:
"In back-to-back votes, Republicans changed the rules for the amount of time it takes to confirm most executive nominees and district judges — marking the second and third time Republicans have used the hardball tactic since taking over in 2015."
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