Vacancies on Joint Chiefs of Staff loom as Tuberville abortion standoff continues
Mike Brest
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More than half of the Joint Chiefs of Staff will leave their roles between July and October, but it’s unclear whether their successors will be in place.
Marine Corps Commandant Gen. David Berger will step down on July 10. Army Chief of Staff Gen. James McConville must step down on August 8, followed by Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Mike Gilday on August 21. The chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Gen. Mark Milley, will be exiting in early October, and his replacement, Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. C.Q. Brown, will create an opening at the top of the Air Force.
BIDEN MAY BUCK BIPARTISAN VOTE TO KEEP MORTGAGE OVERHAUL IN PLACE
The person responsible for possibly preventing President Joe Biden’s selections from assuming their roles on the Joint Staff is Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-AL), the former college football coach serving his first term in the upper chamber of Congress.
Tuberville has put a hold on military promotions and nominations since February due to a Pentagon policy regarding abortion. In light of many conservative states passing laws restricting abortion following the reversal of Roe v. Wade, the department announced it would pay for the travel expenses incurred for a service member or dependent who needs to travel out of state for an abortion.
He’s blocking roughly 250 promotions, and defense officials believe that number could reach 650 general and flag officers by the end of the year.
Pentagon deputy spokeswoman Sabrina Singh called Tuberville’s hold “a dangerous precedent” earlier this month, adding, it “put our military readiness at risk at a time when our military is expected to defend the nation with the acute threat of Russia and address the pacing challenge of [China.]”
While the Senate does technically have the ability to navigate around Tuberville’s hold, it would be costly, time-consuming, and inefficient. Congress typically passes military nominations in batches by unanimous consent, which means it would take only one senator to object to prevent it from moving forward, while voting on each would limit the Senate’s ability to take up other issues.
“The Senate does the vast majority of its business through unanimous consent. That’s how it gets things done, including when it relates to nominations. If you do a large quantity of your work via unanimous consent, if one person objects you no longer have unanimous consent, so yeah, the leadership of the Senate can bring each of those nominations up one by one” but it “just sucks up lots of time,” Bradley Bowman, a director at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies who spent nearly a decade working in the Senate as a defense and national security adviser, told the Washington Examiner.
While Bowman said the ability of one senator to disrupt business in the chamber is “an important power,” it’s his belief that it’s appropriate to do this “when a senator is conducting oversight consistent with the Senate’s constitutional authorities and responsibility and an administration is being inappropriately unresponsive.”
The former top defense adviser to Sen. Kelly Ayotte (R-NH) described it as “inappropriate, and even a little distasteful” to “target military members for the decisions of the administration in the White House.”
Gen. Eric Smith, the nominee to replace Berger following his retirement on July 10, is not likely to be confirmed by then, but he would assume the role on an acting basis due to his current position as the assistant commandant of the Marine Corps.
“It certainly compromises our ability to be most ready,” Smith told the Senate Armed Services Committee, including Tuberville, about two weeks ago.
Smith would represent the first of what the military suspects could be a multitude of leaders forced into their new promotions in an acting capacity if Tuberville’s hold continues going forward, which his spokesperson previously told the Washington Examiner “applies to all two-stars and above.”
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Tuberville has faced criticism from Democrats and members of his own party, and yet he’s shown no sign of standing down anytime soon. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) has distanced himself from Tuberville’s actions, telling reporters last month, “I don’t support putting a hold on military nominations. I don’t support that.”
Biden tapped Gen. Randy George, the Army’s vice chief of staff, to follow Gen. James McConville as the Army’s top officer, while Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin has reportedly recommended Adm. Samuel Paparo, the commander of the Navy’s Pacific Fleet, to be the next chief of naval operations.