Politico reports that Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer lined up votes for Wednesday night to advance three top military nominees whom Sen. Tommy Tuberville has blocked. Schumer said he wouldn’t hold standalone votes for months, but he caved and could have done this months ago.
The three are President Joe Biden’s senior picks — radical Gen. C.Q. Brown to be Joint Chiefs chair, Gen. Randy George to be Army chief of staff, and Gen. Eric Smith to be Marine commandant.
Tuberville won’t stand in the way of standalone votes.
Tuberville planned to force his own cloture vote on Smith’s nomination to lead the Marine Corps, which could have placed Democrats in the awkward position of blocking Biden’s nominees.
There are still hundreds of senior officers waiting for appointments.
Tuberville has for months blocked quick confirmation of general and flag officer promotions to attempt to force the Pentagon to overturn its policy that covers the costs of troops who travel to obtain abortions.
The media has railed about the chaos Sen. Tuberville allegedly caused, but Schumer could have done this any time. He caused the chaos, refusing to negotiate.
Following Schumer’s announcement, Tuberville said he won’t block same-day confirmation votes on Wednesday’s trio of Joint Chiefs picks.
“Individually? Let’s bring them tonight,” Tuberville said. “As long as we go through cloture, as long as we do them individually, not as a group, I’m good with it.”
Tuberville, who has argued that Democrats can vote to confirm officers individually, called Schumer’s move a win. Democrats refused to do this until now.
BREAKING: Chuck Schumer caves to @SenTuberville and announces that he is filing cloture on three of the military promotions that Tuberville has stopped via his block on the Senate’s blanket vote to confirm hundreds of military appointments at once over the Pentagon funding… pic.twitter.com/JoAr5nJXFJ
— Greg Price (@greg_price11) September 20, 2023
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