WASHINGTON – In a last-ditch effort to obstruct President Biden’s Cabinet and agenda, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell is refusing to agree to the organizing resolution that would allow Democrats to take control of committees and quickly confirm President Biden’s Cabinet. The latest obstruction from McConnell leaves Republicans in control of many committees, allowing them to hold up Biden’s Cabinet nominees even further, despite Democrats’ majority as of yesterday. Under McConnell’s leadership during the lame-duck period, the Senate failed to fulfill its responsibility to “advise and consent” on the president’s nominees, holding only five hearings for nominees ahead of Inauguration Day with only one nominee confirmed the same day as President Biden’s swearing-in.
“If McConnell wanted to work with Democrats in good faith, he would have spent the last two months moving President Biden’s Cabinet nominees through the confirmation process — a precedent afforded to every previous president. Instead, he and his caucus slow-walked nominees, leaving President Biden with fewer confirmed Cabinet positions than any other president in recent history,” said Mairead Lynn, spokesperson for the Accountable Senate War Room. “These outsized demands are nothing more than a last-ditch effort to further obstruct the Biden administration from implementing the will of the people. Enough is enough: McConnell needs to drop his unreasonable demands and let the Senate get to work.”
McConnell’s handling of nominees in the lame-duck period and his current demands to the organizing resolution are in stark contrast to the agreement made under a 50-50 Senate in 2001. Ahead of President Bush’s Inauguration — and Vice President Cheney’s tie-breaking vote giving Republicans the majority — Democratic Majority Leader Tom Daschle fulfilled the Senate’s duty to keep the nomination process moving forward, holding hearings for 12 of Bush’s 14 Cabinet nominees ahead of Inauguration Day. As Schumer pushes for the same power-sharing agreement made under Daschle and Republican Leader Trent Lott, McConnell is torpedoing the Senate’s ability to get to work with outsized demands.
This post was originally published on Radio Free.
