‘Recess is for children’ — and Senate gridlock is for Democrats

Senate Republicans were back at it this morning, grinding away at the massive backlog of White House nominations awaiting their approval — and facing the most obstinate Democrat resistance in modern nomination history. If it continues much longer, the majority will face a choice — and the Senate, a change in the rules.

Senators worked until 10 p.m. Thursday night, were back at it at 11 a.m. Friday, had multiple votes ready to proceed, but still had over 150 to go. Friday was also supposed to be the start of a planned recess. But as the bombastic Mike Davis, the Article III Project founder and former chief counsel for nominations to Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), told me Thursday afternoon: “Recess is for children.”

The longer Republicans wait, the longer overwhelmingly Democratic career appointees run the government.

Chamber rules and traditions grant each member a great deal of deference, and individual senators wield impressive amounts of power when they want to, as we saw earlier this week when Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) derailed his own party’s non-controversial, bipartisan package delivering relief to American police. Without unanimous consent, debate can stretch out for as long as 30 hours per nominee, and bills can be debated for weeks.

Unanimous consent was the historic norm for all but the more controversial nominees: Presidents George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton received unanimous consent for 98% of their civilian nominations, according to statistics released by the majority leader’s office.

Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama suffered lower numbers, as the two major parties continued to sort more into ideological camps than regional ones (conservatives and liberals, instead of Northerners and Southerners) and as the 24-hour news cycle turned up the heat and the rewards. But both presidents still enjoyed unanimous consent for 90% of their nominees.

Those numbers plummeted to 65% during President Donald Trump’s first term and continued to decline under President Joe Biden, hitting 57%. Today, in Trump’s second term, that number stands at zero.

This is the reality Republicans are facing. South Dakota Republican Sen. Majority Leader John Thune’s office is quick to point out they have hit a number of records, but dissatisfaction and frustration are growing rapidly. Thus far, for example, the Senate has not confirmed a single U.S. attorney, including for Washington, D.C., or the Southern District of Florida — the two districts where Russiagate-related prosecutions would play out.

Judge Jason Reding Quinones is up for the Florida job. He’s a former assistant U.S. attorney for the southern district, former adviser for the Department of Justice’s National Security Division, and a former Air Force JAG officer. He was reported out of committee ready for a full-Senate vote on May 15 — 78 days ago.

Another embarrassing case is the president’s nominee to the Holy See. Brian Burch has languished for months in political turmoil, leading to the painful spectacle of the first American pope in history having no American ambassador.

The longer Republicans wait, the longer overwhelmingly Democratic career appointees run the government. And Democrats know this.

Meanwhile, Republicans are eager to get out of D.C. and start selling the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. Frankly, it’s not easy caging up a bunch of powerful and independent-minded 70- and 80-year-olds who are used to getting into town late on Monday and hitting the road Thursday afternoon.

If the Democrats continue this course, Republicans can grind away slowly. Neither side wants to spend August in D.C., and when Democrats mounted similar opposition in 2017, members broke and consented just before the August recess they would have begun Friday.

If they refuse to consent, Thune has other options.

One is to adjourn the Senate for a full recess of at least 10 days. That hasn’t happened in decades. But if it did, President Trump could bypass Senate obstruction and make recess appointments lasting through the end of the current Senate term in January 2027.

That option remains remote — for now. It would require the House to return to Washington and vote to adjourn and a Senate majority to agree. Most senators aren’t eager to give up their power to advise and consent. They still want a say in who gets confirmed.

A more plausible route: Change the rules.

The Senate has a long history of rewriting its procedures when obstruction becomes the objective and arcane rules become, as one senior staffer put it, “unbelievable barriers.”

Ideas already under discussion include shortening debate time, bundling nominees into batches (as is done with military promotions), or scrapping Senate approval entirely for certain lower-level posts.

“If Democrats don’t give them anything, make ’em death-march into the weekend,” the staffer told the Beltway Brief. “Make them work 10 and 11 p.m. nights.”

Republicans, he added, “need to make a decision — and it can’t be to let Democrats use ‘norms’ as a weapon to sabotage an elected president’s administration.”

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