Sen. Thune suggests staying through weekend to confirm Trump picks after Dems delay votes: 'Shouldn't be hard'
Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., showed frustration with Democrats on Tuesday after a confirmation vote for President Trump's pick for CIA director in John Ratcliffe, who has bipartisan support, was blocked.
Speaking on the Senate floor after the vote was blocked by Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., Thune said the Senate can remain in session all weekend to confirm Trump's picks if progress continues to be delayed.
"Do we want a vote on these folks on Tuesday or vote on them on Friday, Saturday and Sunday? Because that's what we're going to do. This can be easy or this can be hard," Thune said. "This is about America's national security interests, and we're stalling, so that's not going to happen."
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Ratcliffe was approved by the Senate Intelligence Committee by a bipartisan vote of 14 to 3. Because of that, Thune said the vote to confirm him "shouldn't be hard."
"Democrats and Republicans, in a very big bipartisan fashion, agree that he is very qualified for this job," Thune said, adding that he isn't sure what stalling accomplishes.
When blocking the vote, Murphy said many Democrats have "serious concerns" about Ratcliffe's ability to work as CIA director because he "repeatedly politicized intelligence" during his eight months as National Intelligence director in 2020.
"I don't think it's too much to ask to make sure that we have a full, real debate that lasts two days on the Senate floor," Murphy said on Tuesday.
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Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., who leads the Senate Intelligence Committee, said the delay is for "no good reason" and is simply an attempt "to drag out all of these nominations to play procedural games."
Cotton noted that while the Democrats acted in similar fashion in 2017 with Trump's first administration and the Republicans in 2021 with Biden's picks, that this didn't happen during confirmation votes prior to the past two elections.
"We should especially get back to that practice when it is a highly accomplished, well-qualified nominee of integrity, like John Ratcliffe," Cotton said. "Now we're going to spin our wheels for two days. But, as I said, don't make plans for the weekend. Don't have any dinner dates scheduled starting on Thursday night because we're going to get these nominees done the easy, collegial way. Or apparently the hard way."
Only one of Trump's Cabinet nominees has been confirmed thus far, and that was former Florida senator Marco Rubio as Secretary of State. He was confirmed on Monday by a unanimous vote.
Several nominees have advanced out of committee votes while others still await confirmation hearings.