Senate in round-the-clock session to confirm Trump Cabinet
ASSOCIATED PRESS
In this image from Senate Television, Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., speaks on the floor of the U.S. Senate in Washington, today, about the nomination of Betsy DeVos to be Education Secretary. The Senate will be in session around the clock this week as Republicans aim to confirm more of President Donald Trump’s Cabinet picks over Democratic opposition.
WASHINGTON >> Democrats announced plans today to hold the Senate floor around the clock to protest Republicans’ push to confirm President Donald Trump’s Cabinet picks.
Democrats’ effort got under way as the Senate headed toward a showdown vote Tuesday on Education Secretary nominee Betsy DeVos, a wealthy GOP donor who has advocated for alternatives to public education. DeVos’ nomination has drawn particularly fierce opposition from teachers’ unions and others. Two GOP senators have announced plans to oppose her, which could result in a 50-50 Senate vote Tuesday. That would leave Vice President Mike Pence in the role of tie-breaker, something that has never happened with a Cabinet nominee in the Senate’s history, according to the Senate historian.
“Democrats will hold the floor for the next 24 hours until the final vote to do everything we can to persuade just one more Republican to join us,” Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., said on the floor around mid-day today. “And I strongly encourage people across the country to join us — to double down on your advocacy — and to keep making your voices heard for these last 24 hours.”
Republicans accused Democrats of slow-walking qualified nominees to placate liberal base voters who still haven’t come to terms with Trump’s election.
“It seems this gridlock and opposition has far less to do with the nominees actually before us than the man who nominated them,” said Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky. “Enough is enough.”
In addition to DeVos, Republicans hope to confirm a series of other divisive nominees this week: Alabama Republican Sen. Jeff Sessions as attorney general, GOP Rep. Tom Price of Georgia as secretary of Health and Human Services, and financier Steven Mnuchin as Treasury secretary.
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In each case Democrats intend to use the maximum time allowed under the Senate’s arcane rules to debate the nominations, which may result in a series of late-night votes this week and delay Mnuchin’s approval until Saturday.
Republicans complain that previous presidents have been able to put their Cabinets in place more quickly. Democrats say it’s Trump’s fault because many of his nominees have complicated financial arrangements and ethical entanglements they claim they have not had enough time to dissect. Thus far, six Cabinet and high-level officials have been confirmed, including the secretaries of Defense, Homeland Security and Transportation.
The clash over nominees has created a toxic atmosphere in the Senate that mirrors the tense national mood since Trump’s election, with Democrats boycotting committee votes and Republicans unilaterally jamming nominees through committee without Democrats present. Republicans control the Senate with a narrow 52-48 margin, yet there is very little suspense about the final outcome on any of the nominees. That’s because Democrats themselves changed Senate rules when they were in the majority several years ago so that Cabinet nominees can now be approved with a simple majority in the 100-seat Senate, not the 60 votes previously required.
9 responses to “Senate in round-the-clock session to confirm Trump Cabinet”
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these dimm’s are acting like petulant children.
they in one hole and they keep digging.
auwe!
You gotta’ admit that it’s an awful lot of fun to watch the democrat meltdown. The one thing that Barry Hussein and fake native American Sen. Warren did well was screwing up their party.
And in the end, Ms Betsy DeVos will be seated as the Secretary of Education. What a loss of Democrat effort. Seems the Dem’s are at loss of vision and direction. Did you hear of Sen. Schumer voting against Ms Elaine Chao for Secretary of Transportation, Ms Chao the wife of the Senate Majority Leader McConnell?
IdiotDems in total disarray…that’s a good thing! lol Thank you BO for creating it! Damaged for Decades!
“That’s because Democrats themselves changed Senate rules when they were in the majority several years ago so that Cabinet nominees can now be approved with a simple majority in the 100-seat Senate, not the 60 votes previously required.”
What goes around comes around…
The SA headline has it backwards. The Senate is in session to block Betsy DeVos. It’s hard to say that DeVos is the worst of Trump’s Cabinet nominees because so many of them are so astoundingly bad. Senators have described DeVos and her performance as “embarrassingly unprepared” or “uniquely unqualified” or “astonishing ignorance” or “obvious lack of knowledge.” DeVos has had a disastrous impact on public education in Michigan, and her primary qualification, in Trump’s eyes at least, is that she’s a billionaire, having inherited a fortune from her father’s pyramid scheme. So far in her confirmation hearings, even as Republicans have tried to lob creampuff questions at her, she has succeeded only in exposing her lack of familiarity with fundamental issues and laws related to public education — and a willingness to have guns in schools to provide protection against the “potential grizzly bears” that might be roaming the hallways. DeVos did so poorly at her hearing that she submitted written answers to a series of questions, but that didn’t help either when it was discovered that she plagiarized the answers from a magazine, from the Department of Education website, and even from one of Obama’s nominees. She knows as little about education as Ben Carson knows about housing.
Anticipate the block being unsuccessful despite the protestations of the Dems. Your accusations are along the same lines of Obama mispronouncing corpsman; amounts to a hill of beans.
Democrats are living up to the Democratic Party logo – jacka$$es.
Hey Democrats!You already had far too much time deciding who is qualified or who’s not. They come up with this same excuse:”But,but we need more Time”,the people needs to know. Baloney !
STOP WHINING and just get to work! Just vote a “Yay Vote Or a Nay Vote”. simple as that!Stop embarrassing yourselves,you lost the election.Move ON! As the Hawaiians say……IMUA!