These past few months have highlighted that Senate Republicans have not made the necessary efforts to get judges confirmed. It would seem that many qualified candidates have essentially been passed over. As a result, there is a great need for the Senate to step up between Christmas and New Year’s so that at the very least, they can confirm the nominees who’ve had to wait for the longest period so far.
It’s surprising that Republicans haven’t capitalised on this opportunity as it would have proved to be the most convenient way to gain the favour of their most dedicated supporters. Not to mention the fact that judicial nominations only require 50 votes in addition to that of the Vice President’s as opposed to 60. One could argue that the Republicans are in need of revising their approach as this past week, 57 nominees saw their nominations expired without a single vote being cast in either direction. However, Trump could re-nominate all of them if he so wished.
At the moment, there are 31 nominations which have successfully passed through the Judiciary Committee. The importance of this is that they could (without much of a hassle) attract 50 Republican votes. However, these 31 nominations have remained unaddressed despite being available for confirmation. Some would point fingers at Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell for not devoting the necessary time to them.
Worth mentioning is that the Democrats have made full use of delaying tactics in order to deal with nominations they can’t defeat through votes. Once cloture has been filed, they can demand a debate of 30 hours on any nominee. Considering the position McConnell occupies within the Senate, it’s clear he has many duties to attend to. Thus, he’s likely not willing to dedicate 30 hours of debate to each nominee.
However, considering the fact that some of these nominees have passed through the Judiciary Committee for as long as 10 months, one has to wonder why the necessary action has not been taken and why the Republicans seem to have lost focus after Kavanaugh was confirmed for the Supreme Court.
