GOP to go ‘nuclear’ to push through backlog of Trump’s nominees

By Ted Barrett, Morgan Rimmer, CNN

(CNN) — Frustrated Republicans are expected to begin as early as Monday a process to change Senate rules to allow them to quickly confirm a backlog of President Donald Trump’s nominees, according to a source familiar with the planning.

Democrats, angry at many of Trump’s policies – such as cutting foreign aid and accepting a luxury jet from Qatar – have been slow-walking his nominees for months in protest. They oppose the rule change.

Republicans will push it through using the “nuclear option,” which would allow them to change Senate rules on a majority vote, not the 67 typically required for such a change.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer railed against the move to change Senate rules without Democratic buy-in to allow for quicker consideration of the president’s nominees, warning the GOP that they “will come to regret” this decision.

“What will stop Donald Trump from nominating even worse individuals than we’ve seen to date, knowing this chamber will rubber stamp anything he wishes? I say to my Republican colleagues, think carefully, before taking this step. If you go nuclear, it’s going to be a decision you will come to regret,” he said.

The move, which will allow votes on groups of nominees, en banc, instead of individually, will apply only to executive civilian nominees – not the judiciary nor Cabinet members.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune said that Senate Republicans will wrap the process of changing the chamber’s rules without Democratic support “next week,” as they start taking procedural steps to speed up confirmation of Trump’s nominees.

“We gotta start the process this week, probably conclude it next week,” he told CNN as he arrived at the Capitol on Monday.

Thune made the case in an op-ed in Breitbart Monday for changing Senate rules – without Democratic support – this week, claiming that Democrats have engaged in “historic” obstruction of nominees and insisting it’s time to make changes.

“It’s delay for delay’s sake, and it’s a pettiness that leaves desks sitting empty in agencies across the federal government and robs our duly elected president of a team to enact the agenda that the American people voted for in November,” Thune wrote.

While Republicans say Democratic obstruction is at an unprecedented level, they used similar tactics when they were in the minority and a Democratic president was in office.

There are currently 149 nominees who have been voted out of committee and are waiting for votes on the floor, with another approximately 150 nominees working through the committee pipeline, the source said.

Current rules provide that after a vote to break a filibuster of a nominee is successful, two hours of debate are allotted for Democrats to speak in opposition. Republicans argue Democrats rarely use that floor time, so it ends up just being wasted time and a long slow grind to get these lower-level nominees confirmed.

Thune wrote he had convened a group of GOP senators from across his conference’s ideological spectrum to discuss how to approach rules changes and said they will put their plan into action this week.

“When the Senate convenes this week, I will begin the necessary procedural steps to reform the Senate’s rules. No party should be able to weaponize the confirmation process the way that Senate Democrats are doing now, in a way that has never been done before,” he wrote.

“This total obstruction simply cannot be the standard moving forward – both in principle and in practicality. We must return to the Senate’s traditional confirmation process that existed before this unprecedented blockade.”

This story has been updated with additional developments.

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