Biden struggling to get nominees over the finish line despite Senate majority
Sarah Westwood
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Despite enjoying many of the perks of a Democratic majority in the Senate, the Biden administration is struggling to get nominees over the finish line in a series of confirmation processes that have turned contentious.
President Joe Biden’s pick to lead the Federal Aviation Administration became the latest casualty of the polarized environment when he withdrew from consideration on Monday amid scrutiny of his record.
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Phillip Washington, the FAA nominee, had stumbled through a confirmation hearing earlier this month. Washington repeatedly conceded that he did not know the answers to questions about technical aspects of air safety during an exchange with Sen. Ted Budd (R-NC), and he failed to answer questions from Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) about what went wrong during two commercial airline crashes in 2018 and 2019 involving a Boeing model that the FAA had certified as safe to fly.
“Unlike other FAA administrators, he does not have decades of aviation experience. Washington has never flown a plane, never worked for an airline, and never worked for a company that manufactures or maintains aircraft,” Cruz and Budd had written in an op-ed in the Washington Examiner last week. “But what he does have are political connections. He donated to the Biden campaign, co-chaired its policy committee on infrastructure, and led the Biden administration’s transition team for the Department of Transportation.”
Washington’s withdrawal comes after the collapse of another high-profile regulatory nomination this month. Gigi Sohn, who Biden nominated to a post on the Federal Communications Commission, had fought for months to overcome scrutiny of her past progressive activism.
Her social media posts became a liability during the Senate confirmation process, including a tweet she’d shared that labeled former President Donald Trump a “raggedy white supremacist president” and a post in which she claimed Fox News is “dangerous to democracy.”
Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) effectively sunk her nomination when he said he could not vote for Sohn.
In January, Biden’s pick for a top human rights post at the State Department withdrew from consideration amid questions from Sen. Jim Risch (R-ID) about her attitude toward Israel given some of her past statements on social media.
That followed a series of other nomination withdrawals and confirmation failures last year, including for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement chief, Office of Management and Budget controller, Labor Department Wage and Hour Division chief, and a top Energy Department position focused on electricity.
But even more nominees are presently trapped in a state of limbo — either because of controversy they’ve created or because of procedural complications.
Charnelle Bjelkengren, nominated by Biden to serve as a U.S. district judge for the Eastern District of Washington, imperiled her chances of confirmation in January when she failed to answer basic questions from Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA) about the articles of the Constitution during her hearing.
Kato Crews, nominated by Biden for the U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado, also withered under Kennedy’s questioning during his confirmation hearing last week.
Crews could not provide any definition for a so-called Brady motion, the legal requirement that prosecutors must share potentially favorable evidence with defense lawyers.
Michael Delaney, the nominee for the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, has faced pushback from some Democrats over his signature on a 2005 legal brief defending a New Hampshire law, which has since been repealed, requiring minors to notify their parents before obtaining an abortion.
And beyond the controversial ones, all judicial nominees have faced an uncertain path forward given the lengthy absence of Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, due to illness. The traditional “blue slip” policy, an informal practice on the committee that allows senators to hold up nominees in their home states, has also slowed the pace of judicial confirmations after Biden secured a significant number at the start of his presidency.
Pentagon nominees have faced delays in recent weeks thanks to Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-AL). Tuberville has blocked more than 150 confirmations and promotions at the Department of Defense over the past month in protest of the military’s decision to fund travel for service members seeking abortions.
“I’m holding the DOD nominations because the secretary of defense is trying to push through a massive expansion of taxpayer-subsidized abortions without going through this body, without going through Congress,” Tuberville, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said on the Senate floor earlier this month.
Biden’s pick to run the National Archives, Colleen Shogan, has weathered weeks of criticism from Republicans over her social media posts and perceptions of her as a partisan nominee for a nonpartisan role.
Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) has accused Shogan of lying under oath by previously telling his committee that her social media presence was apolitical and benign despite examples of posts in which she criticized Republicans.
Shogan has also faced accusations from a whistleblower who worked with her at the Congressional Research Service. The whistleblower claimed she had engaged in “abusive” and “partisan” behavior.
The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee nonetheless advanced her nomination to the full Senate earlier this month.
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Even for nominees who make it out of committee, the road to confirmation could be difficult for the time being. Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA) has also been absent for weeks due to a hospitalization, costing Democrats a second vote that could prove crucial in close nomination fights.
Vice President Kamala Harris has already had to break a tie this month during a confirmation vote held amid the absences; she helped confirm a judicial nominee in early March.