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Senate Republicans are still not done with their effort to alter Senate procedure to expedite the confirmation of blocs of President Trump’s non-cabinet and judicial nominees all at once. But if all goes according to plan, Senate Republicans should be able to confirm the nominees in question by the end of the week.
GOP TRIGGERS NUCLEAR OPTION IN SENATE TO BREAK DEM BLOCKADE OF TRUMP NOMINEES
The Senate votes tonight to adopt the new “executive” resolution which Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) engineered to make it easier to approve batches of lower-level nominees in one fell swoop.
Thune will likely “file cloture” (which is the method to cut off debate in the Senate) on the actual bloc of 48 nominees which he hopes to confirm as a slate later today.
By rule, there must be a day before the Senate can vote to break a filibuster on the slate of nominees. That will ripen for a vote on Wednesday with Tuesday serving as the “intervening day.”
So Wednesday is the day to watch.
That bloc of nominees will NOT score the 60 votes necessary to break a filibuster.
But Thune will switch his vote to be on the prevailing side (in this case, the noes), and order a re-vote. Senate rules allow a senator on the “winning” side of an issue to call for a new vote.
Thune will then make a point of order that the precedent of the Senate should be a simple majority to break a filibuster on a bloc of lower-level nominees like these. The chair will rule against Thune. But that’s what Thune wants. He will then appeal the ruling of the chair that is in fact a simple majority to break a filibuster on a batch of nominees like that. If the Senate then secures a simple majority to overrule the chair, Thune will have established a new precedent for this type of slate for nominees. Thune will then ask that the Senate re-vote the failed vote to break a filibuster. That is Thune’s right since he changed his vote earlier. But rather than 60 votes to break a filibuster, it will only take a simple majority.
That is the new “precedent” for breaking a filibuster for low-level nominees. After the Senate burns off its “post cloture” time on Thursday, the Senate will finally vote to confirm this batch of 48 nominees.
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