Senate Republicans are weighing a number of options to expedite the confirmation of President Donald Trump’s nominees on the floor of the Senate in order to overcome Democratic filibusters, members warn.
While no decisions have been made, Republicans discussed a range of potential plays they could make during their Tuesday lunch as pressure mounts from Trump to stay in session to clear more of his nominees during the August recess.
While some Republicans are pushing for recess appointments, doing so would be virtually impossible at this point given that the House left town without adjourning for a five-week recess and would have to return to pass a concurrent resolution with the Senate.
The other options on the table, according to senators would be speeding up how long it takes to process nominees or grouping more of them together.
“We are absolutely trying to avoid a nuclear option issue, but at some point you have to have an operational government and when you are shutting down the government, not letting the president get his people into office and shutting down nominees who have been near unanimous or almost unanimous consent coming out of committees, you are doing it for obstruction purposes only,” Sen. Mike Rounds of South Dakota said.
Rounds warned that “it’s an active conversation” right now what other things they can do.
Other Republicans like Sen. John Kennedy of Louisiana and Eric Schmitt of Missouri are more bullish on recess appointments but again, that is a much less likely scenario given the fact the House has already left town.
“It’s the first time every single one has been filibustered by the Democrats, and that’s going to be met with a response [of] recess appointments – unless Chuck Schumer changes his tune – they’re coming,” Schmitt said.
Kennedy said he expects the Senate to be in through the weekend as Republicans try to push through confirmations of nominees.
“I wouldn’t faint with surprise if we were here through the weekend,” Kennedy told reporters Tuesday.
Republicans, including Kennedy, have criticized Democrats for refusing to speed up the confirmation of the president’s nominees by pushing the less controversial ones through using “unanimous consent” – a faster process than individual roll call votes along with other procedural delays. Republican have used similar tactics with nominees during Democratic administrations.
Kennedy said senators need to get home to address pressing concerns with their constituents, including the controversy around the Jeffrey Epstein files.
“It’s not like senators want to go back home and just lay around. They want to go back home and answer their people’s questions about the reconciliation bill and the rescission bill and what they think about, frankly, the Epstein files, that’s all anybody seems to want to talk about, and they want to go back and talk to their constituents,” he said.
CNN’s Aileen Graef contributed to this report.
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