WASHINGTON (AP) — The Senate has confirmed 48 of President Donald Trump’s nominees directly, voting for the primary time below new guidelines to start clearing a backlog of govt department positions that had been delayed by Democrats.
Annoyed by the stalling techniques, Senate Republicans moved final week to make it simpler to verify giant teams of lower-level, non-judicial nominations. Democrats had pressured a number of votes on virtually each certainly one of Trump’s picks, infuriating the president and tying up the Senate flooring.
The brand new guidelines enable Senate Republicans to maneuver a number of nominees with a easy majority vote — a course of that will have beforehand been blocked with only one objection. The foundations don’t apply to judicial nominations or high-level Cupboard posts.
“Republicans have fastened a damaged course of,” Senate Majority Chief John Thune mentioned forward of the vote.
The Senate voted 51-47 to verify the 4 dozen nominees. Thune mentioned that these confirmed on Thursday had all obtained bipartisan votes in committee, together with deputy secretaries for the Departments of Protection, Inside, Power and others.
Andrew Harnik by way of Getty Pictures
Among the many confirmed are Jonathan Morrison, the brand new administrator of the Nationwide Freeway Visitors Security Administration, and Kimberly Guilfoyle as U.S. ambassador to Greece. Guilfoyle is a former California prosecutor and tv information character who led the fundraising for Trump’s 2020 marketing campaign and was as soon as engaged to Trump’s son, Donald Trump Jr.
Thune’s transfer is the newest salvo after a dozen years of gradual adjustments by each events to weaken the filibuster and make the nominations course of extra partisan. Each events have obstructed one another’s nominees for years, and senators in each events have advocated for rushing up the method when they’re within the majority.
Republicans first proposed altering the principles in early August, when the Senate left for a monthlong recess after a breakdown in bipartisan negotiations over the affirmation course of and Trump advised Senate Democratic Chief Chuck Schumer to “GO TO HELL!” on social media.
Democrats have blocked extra nominees than ever earlier than as they’ve struggled to search out methods to oppose Trump and the GOP-dominated Congress, and as their voters have pushed them to combat Republicans at each flip. It’s the primary time in latest historical past that the minority celebration hasn’t allowed not less than some fast confirmations.
Senate Democratic Chief Chuck Schumer has mentioned Democrats are delaying the nominations as a result of Trump’s nominees are “traditionally dangerous.” And he advised Republicans that they are going to “come to remorse” their motion — echoing the same warning from GOP Chief Mitch McConnell to then-Majority Chief Harry Reid, D-Nev., in 2013, when Democrats modified Senate guidelines for govt department and decrease court docket judicial nominees to take away the 60-vote threshold for confirmations. On the time, Republicans have been blocking President Barack Obama’s picks.
Republicans took the Senate majority a 12 months later, and McConnell ultimately did the identical for Supreme Court docket nominees in 2017 as Democrats tried to dam Trump’s nomination of Justice Neil Gorsuch.
“What Republicans have executed is chip away on the Senate much more, to present Donald Trump extra energy and to rubber stamp whomever he needs, every time he needs them, no questions requested,” Schumer mentioned final week.
Republicans will transfer to verify a second tranche of nominees within the coming weeks, regularly clearing the record of greater than 100 nominations which were pending for months.
“There shall be extra to return,” Thune mentioned Thursday. “And we’ll make sure that President Trump’s administration is stuffed at a tempo that appears extra like these of his predecessors.”