The high-stakes nomination of Todd Blanche to be attorney general has turned into a clash of wills between President Trump and two Senate Republicans whose political careers he claims credit for ending.
After a vote on Blanche’s nomination was delayed over concerns raised by two lame-duck Republican senators, the president said Thursday he might put Blanche’s nomination on hold rather than meet their demands.
Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) and Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) have indicated that they will vote to support advancing Blanche’s nomination only if the Justice Department provides written assurance that it has completely abandoned a controversial $1.8-billion “anti-weaponization” fund created as part of a settlement between Trump and the Internal Revenue Service and will limit the scope of tax audit immunity granted to Trump, his sons and a business.
Those provisions were part of a proposed settlement of a $10-billion lawsuit Trump filed against the IRS, which is part of his administration.
“The opposition to such a high-ranking executive branch nomination from within Republican ranks is quite unprecedented,” said Phil Brest, who was a top Democratic staffer for the Senate Judiciary Committee during the nominations of Jeff Sessions, Bill Barr and Merrick Garland, who each served as attorney general.
The Senate careers of both Cornyn and TIllis are coming to an end this year after Trump declined to endorse them.
“John Cornyn, of Texas, and Thom Tillis, of North Carolina, both of whom I refused to Endorse, and whose political careers have been ended by my action, are refusing to vote for this Great Nominee,” Trump wrote on Truth Social, his social media platform. “I have no objection to temporarily withdrawing Todd’s name, if they do not do the right thing, and putting him back after Cornyn and Tillis are out of office.”
But that decision brings about its own political risk.
With the president’s approval rating sitting below 35% in recent polls, Democrats could shrink or even reverse the Republican Party’s current 53-seat Senate majority this November. Cornyn‘s and Tillis’ seats in Texas and North Carolina are both at risk of flipping to Democrats.
“So waiting until 2027 could be far harder than it is right now,” said Jessica Taylor, the Senate and governors editor at the nonpartisan Cook Political Report.
Blanche has been serving as acting attorney general since Atty. Gen Pam Bondi was fired in April. He was previously the deputy attorney general and has been associated with some of the most controversial policies associated with the Trump administration, including the IRS settlement, the handling of the Epstein files and prosecutions of Trump’s perceived enemies.
Blanche can continue in the acting role even if he is not confirmed, but the Trump administration would be blocked from appointing a new deputy attorney general unless he is confirmed.
Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which is vetting Blanche, told reporters Thursday that he is hoping to keep Blanche’s nomination on track.
“I’m going to work real hard the next few days to get this thing settled. That’s what we’re going to do. I’m not going to consider any other option, because there’s no reason to consider other options at this point,” Grassley said.
Because the Senate is scheduled to begin its five-week August recess at the end of next week, Blanche probably wouldn’t come before the full Senate for a vote until September at the earliest if the nomination advances out of the Judiciary Committee.
That would put the vote squarely in the middle of peak campaign season, which could present vulnerable Republicans such as Sen. Susan Collins of Maine and Sen. Dan Sullivan of Alaska with a difficult vote on a nominee who has been linked to many of the Trump administration’s most polarizing policies.
A vote against Blanche could incur the wrath of Trump, while a vote for him could turn off moderate voters.
“It’s a Catch-22 for a lot of these candidates. They still need Trump’s voters to come out, but they still need a swing vote as well,” Taylor said.
Blanche worked earlier in his career as a federal prosecutor in New York but was more recently Trump’s criminal defense attorney in the lead-up to his second term in the White House
Blanche faced questions about his independence from his former client throughout his nomination hearing earlier this month. But his answer to one seemingly friendly question, about whether he and Trump are friends, might have inadvertently hurt his case.
“I’m his lawyer,” Blanche replied, before correcting himself. “Was his lawyer.”
The Judiciary Committee currently has 12 Republicans and 10 Democrats. With all 10 Democrats firmly in opposition to Blanche, a vote against moving forward by Cornyn or Tillis would probably put an end to the nomination.
This isn’t the first time Tillis has wielded his political leverage during a high-stakes nomination process.
He briefly blocked the nomination of Federal Reserve Chairman Kevin Warsh until the Justice Department dropped a lawsuit against outgoing Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell.
“Sen. Tillis has been unafraid to use his vote to extract concessions from the Trump administration,” said Brest, who is now president of the American Constitution Society, a progressive legal nonprofit. “There’s a playbook for this and he has been effective with that playbook.”
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