Supplemental Appropriations Act, 2019

Floor Speech

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, I come to the floor to discuss the unprecedented obstruction that has faced President Trump's nominees for the past 26 months--and counting--and to announce that the Senate is going to do something about it.

The systematic, across-the-board delay and obstruction that have crippled this administration's nominations are unique in American history.

Every Presidential election since Adams beat Jefferson in 1796 has left some Senators disappointed that their side lost. There is always a losing side, and they are never happy about it. But the past 2 years have been the first time--the first time ever--that the unhappy party has used Senate procedure to systematically blockade the new President's nominees and prevent him from even staffing up his administration. Let me say that again. Since January 2017, for the first time in the 230-year history of the U.S. Senate, a minority of Senators have used Senate procedure to systematically prevent the President of the United States from putting a full team in place.

During the first 2 years of the last six Presidential administrations before President Trump, 24 total cloture votes had to be held to advance a nomination, but in President Trump's first 2 years, there were 128 cloture votes on nominees.

For 42 different executive branch positions, cloture votes have been required for the first time in history--the first time ever. Uncontroversial Assistant Secretaries and Agencies' general counsels never required cloture votes before--ever--until this particular Democratic minority.

Just compare President Trump's first 2 years to President Obama's. Overall, we have confirmed 22 percent fewer nominations for President Trump and sent more than twice as many back to the White House.

Take just the Foreign Relations Committee as one example. The share of nominees sent to the Foreign Relations Committee who were still not confirmed after President Trump's first 2 years was more than three times--three times--what it was for President Obama.

To be clear, the lion's share of all of these are not controversial, high-profile figures. In most cases, they are unambiguously well- qualified nominees for critical but lower profile jobs.

For example, it took more than 6 months--6 months--and several tragic railroad accidents that made national news before a minority of Senators would allow us to confirm the President's nominee to head the Federal Railroad Administration. That is 6 months and several railroad accidents to get us to confirm the President's nominee to head the Federal Railroad Administration.

He had worked in railroads as an engineer, manager, and executive for 45 years. Our colleagues on the Commerce Committee voice-voted him out of committee. Actually, when Democrats finally allowed his nomination to come to the floor--when they finally allowed that--he was confirmed by voice vote. Despite the fact that nobody actually objected to this nominee, this important job was held empty for 6 long months. It is obstruction for obstruction's sake.

It is the same story with even the least controversial judicial nominees. Last January, it took more than a week of floor time to confirm four district judges, all of whom had been voice-voted out of the Judiciary Committee the previous autumn, but there were still months of delays. Then cloture votes were required for each, but once we finally plowed through to the confirmation votes, they were all confirmed unanimously.

There were months of delays and procedural roadblocks for four bipartisan nominees whom not a single Senator actually opposed.

This is not a principled maneuver, not thoughtful use of minority powers, but obstruction simply for the sake of obstruction.

This historic campaign isn't fair to our duly elected President, and, more importantly, it is not fair to the American people. The American people deserve the government they elected. They deserve important positions to be promptly filled with capable individuals, not held open indefinitely out of political spite.

As we all acknowledge, from an institutional perspective, this is completely unsustainable, but if we allow it to persist, it seems guaranteed to become standard operating procedure for every administration going forward.

Let's assume 2 years from now that my side is in the minority, and there is a Democratic President. If we allow this to persist, we will be doing the same thing to those guys that they have been doing to us. It will be the new norm.

Some of our colleagues who are leading the systematic obstruction are actually running for President themselves. Well, these tactics will virtually guarantee that any future Democratic administration is subjected to the same paralysis. Everybody will be doing it.

Is this how the American Government is supposed to work from here on out--whichever party loses the White House basically prohibits the new President from standing up an administration?

We can't accept this. This just can't be allowed to continue. We need to restore the Senate to the way it functioned for literally decades.

Remember, the idea that nominees would regularly require cloture votes was completely foreign to the Senate until this sad chapter began during the administration of President Bush 41, in the early 2000s.

As of 1968--1968--cloture had never been required for any nomination--any nomination. As of 1978, it had been required for two-- two as of 1978.

Until 2003, in no conference--none--had more than 12 cloture motions ever been needed for nominations. But now, again, President Trump's chosen nominees faced 128 cloture votes in the Congress that just past. So this entire conversation is a modern aberration. This hasn't been going on forever. This is a fairly recent thing. This behavior is new. We need to restore the Senate's tradition in this area. Fortunately, we have a clear roadmap to do just that.

In 2013, immediately after President Obama's reelection, 78 Senators, including me, passed a bipartisan standing order to speed up the consideration of many Presidential nominees. Seventy-eight Members of this body passed a standing order to help President Obama speed up the Executive Calendar.

It reduced the postcloture time for most nominations without touching the Supreme Court, circuit courts, or the highest levels of the executive branch. Essentially everything else got a more streamlined process so nominees could be confirmed more efficiently.

Again, President Obama had just been inaugurated for the second time days earlier. You better believe Republicans were disappointed we had lost, but we did not throw a systematic tantrum. Instead, a sizable number of us came over and joined the Democrats to help the Senate process noncontroversial nominations, as it had for the vast bulk of the history of the Senate. I was a Republican leader in the minority, and I still supported it. We judged if it was the right thing to do, and we did it. The standing order passed 78 to 16.

So, today, I am filing cloture on a resolution that takes that bipartisan effort as its blueprint. This resolution from Senator Blunt and Senator Lankford would implement very similar steps and make them a permanent part of the Senate going forward.

The Supreme Court, circuit courts, Cabinet-level executive positions, and certain independent boards and commissions would not change, but for most other nominations--for literally the hundreds of lower level nominations that every new President makes--postcloture debate time would be reduced from 30 hours to 2 hours.

This would keep the floor moving. It would facilitate more efficient consent agreements, and, most importantly, it would allow the administration--finally, 2 years into its tenure--to staff numerous important positions that remain unfilled with nominees who have been languishing.

This resolution has come up through the regular order, through the Rules Committee, and next week we will vote on it. It deserves the same kind of bipartisan vote that Senator Schumer and Senator Reid's proposal received back during the Obama administration.

I understand that many of my Democratic colleagues have indicated they would be all for this reform as long as it doesn't go into effect until 2021, when they obviously hope someone else might be in the White House, but they are reluctant to support it now. Give me a break. That is unfair on its face.

My Democratic colleagues were more than happy to support a similar proposal back in 2013 under President Obama. They whisper in our ears privately that they would support it now if it took effect in 2021, oh, but they can't support it now, especially under these unprecedented circumstances, simply because we have a Republican President.

Fair is fair. Members of this body should only support reforms that they would be as ready to support in the minority as they are in the majority.

Put another way, if my side is in the minority 2 years from now, I don't think this will be unfair, and it will not disadvantage us in the wake of a new Democratic President. This is a change the institution needs--a change the institution made already, basically, with a 2-year experiment when President Obama was in office. This is reform that every Member should embrace when their party controls the White House and when it does not control the White House.

I urge every one of my colleagues: Let's get the Senate back to a normal historical pattern for handling Presidential nominations. Let's give President Trump, as well as all future Presidents, a functional process for building their administrations. Let's give the American people the government they actually elected, and let's seize this chance to do so through the bipartisan regular order that we are pursuing here, both in committee and now on the floor.

The status quo is unsustainable for the Senate and for the country. It is unfair to this President and to future Presidents of either party. It cannot stand, and it will not stand.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

Source