WASHINGTON ― Republicans triggered the “nuclear” option on Thursday, unilaterally changing the Senate’s rules to confirm President Donald Trump’s nominees more quickly and dealing yet another blow to minority rights in the upper chamber, where the filibuster’s days are increasingly looking numbered.
GOP senators voted to establish a new precedent that will allow them to confirm scores of Trump’s nominees in large batches, rather than individually. It applies only to ambassadors and lower-ranking executive nominees ― which Republican senators said is needed to overcome unprecedented Democratic obstruction and fill out Trump’s administration. They plan to confirm a list of 48 Trump nominees with a single vote under the new precedent next week.
“Democrats — and their political base — cannot deal with the fact that the American people elected President Trump,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R.-S.D.) said in a speech on Thursday. “And so they’re dragging out every confirmation in retaliation.
When Democrats pressed Thune for more time to hammer out a bipartisan agreement and to postpone a vote on changing the rules to next week, Thune declined, expressing his frustration with the pace of confirmations so far.
