As far as the election security briefing goes, don’t hold a committee hearing. Just have an informal meeting with Bill Evanina ( over coffee) with the Rep members of the committee. The members can come out in front of the cameras after their coffee meeting and talk about what they discussed. If the Dems object, screw them. It is just like the black caucus having a meeting.
Invoking the Two-Hour Rule
Most of the time, the restrictions of the two-hour rule are not invoked. It is a routine, often daily, occurrence for committees to be given permission to meet during periods proscribed by the rule after agreements are announced on the Senate floor that grant them the authority to do so.5 Committee staff, when preparing for a hearing or a markup, routinely notify floor staff of the time and date of the meeting to ensure it is included in any unanimous consent agreement or joint leadership announcement.
Sometimes, however, the two-hour rule's restrictions on committee meeting are insisted upon, most commonly as a form of protest or to delay a committee's action on a specific measure or matter.6
To invoke the rule does not necessarily require any formal parliamentary action. Senators can object if a unanimous consent agreement for committees to meet is propounded on the floor. In practice, however, informal communication with leadership is likely required to invoke the rule. This is true not only because the leaders alone could grant permission for committees to meet but also because, from a practical perspective, it would be difficult for Senators to predict when any unanimous consent agreement might be propounded so that they could arrange to be present to object.
It was the long-standing practice of the Senate that, after receiving the requests from committees and clearing them with the minority leader, the majority leader (or a designee) would state on the floor
I have [number] unanimous consent requests for committees to meet during today's session of the Senate. They have the approval of the majority and minority leaders. I ask consent that these requests be agreed to and these requests be printed in the Record.
If no Senator objected, the Congressional Record would print, as if they were spoken on the floor, a series of unanimous consent requests for each committee to meet at stated times, each request being ordered "without objection."
Perhaps partly due to this practice, it was widely understood in the Senate that unanimous consent was necessary to permit committees to meet after the Senate was in session for two hours or past 2:00 p.m.7 If leaders usually honored any request to prevent committees from meeting, then that practice would also leave the impression that unanimous consent was required.
Currently, permission for Senate committees to sit during times prohibited by the two-hour rule is being granted almost exclusively by joint leadership agreement instead of by unanimous consent, a change from prior practice.8 A Senator on the floor now typically states
I have [number] requests for committees to meet during today's session of the Senate. They have the approval of the majority and minority leaders.
The presiding officer responds, "duly noted" to the Senator; no opportunity is afforded for a Senator to object, because unanimous consent is not requested. The list of committees authorized to meet is then printed in the Congressional Record following the statement made on the floor. Joint leadership permission has been used over 130 times since November 30, 2016, to authorize one or more Senate committees to meet during restricted hours and now appears to be the preferred way to provide a waiver of the rule.9 The change in practice might be in response to an apparent increase in invoking the rule, discussed in the final section of this report.
Well, then cancel the hearings and go straight to a vote. Blame Schmuckie for trashing the hearings.
I believe it was Rush the other day who stated there is no
mention of committee oversight when it comes to these
SCOTUS Justice Appointments. I’ve seen others state that
we should just skip them.
Honestly, with all the games going on, why not. Just
put the persons name out, and have a vote.
Schumer can sit in the back room playing tiddly-winks by
himself.
Schumer’s a traitor. Period. Somebody should impose a two hour rule on him, i.e. you’ve got two hours to get the hell out of DC.
Where is the “Rule” that says the Minority makes the Rules? I think this is Fake News.
Send Schumer to Gitmo please.
Is there some New York thing that makes old Jews talk like prissy old women? Schumer and Bloomberg both sound like that.