Biden Cabinet Confirmation Live Thread ***hearings, votes, etc.***

[South Dakota Democrat]

Who will have the most trouble getting confirmed? Tanden?

Tanden (and maybe also Raimondo) is probably going to have the most trouble.

I could see it being the case where Republicans are unilaterally opposed to Tanden and Manchin/Sinema/Tester potentially also being opposed to her. It might end up being a 50/50 split with Kamala needing to tiebreak. Kamala obviously wouldn't vote against Tanden's nomination.

I kinda want Bernie to sink her nomination as a revenge, but he's too nice and has far too much class to do that.

You mean like when he worked hard to get Debbie Wasserman Schulz primaried because wouldn't let his team steal Hillary's files from the DNC database (not to mention pressuring her removal as DNC chair)?

Or when he sabotaged Hillary's campaign in 2016 by refusing to concede for four months, ultimately holding the party hostage for his concession and endorsement (which included having DWS step down as DNC), and then doing virtually nothing to help her defeat Trump?

Yeah, GTFO with that nonsense.

Also, I don't think Bernie really cares about how Tanden engages with dumbasses on Twitter and how calls them out on their garbage.  I am very looking forward to the hysteric meltdowns from the Bernie Bros when he does vote to confirm her.

He did 39 rallies for her in 2016, which was less than what Hillary did for Obama in 2008.  Please know what you're talking about before you post.

[South Dakota Democrat]

Baring any major revelations, Biden will be the first President since Reagan to go undefeated in his first round of cabinet appointments.

Unless Hawley continues continues his stupid schtick(or Cruz or Paul for that matter), I would assume Buttigieg could get it for VA,maybe Raimondo? Whoever is in charge of the VA as well

Does the VP swear everyone in?

Huh?

[South Dakota Democrat]

https://mobile.twitter.com/mkraju/status/1354485951720992768
https://mobile.twitter.com/mkraju/status/1354486075658526721

I didn't know that Mayorkas would be so controversial. Bad news for Tanden.

Not really. Tanden will still get confirmed as long as Kamala shows up, the only problem being that the Senate will likely be forced to eat up days of floor time on her nomination too. Moreso bad news for the Senate than for her.

I think that Manchin will vote no on Tanden. Sinema may vote no as well.

No.

[South Dakota Democrat]

No.

Why not?

Why would they?

[South Dakota Democrat]

Why would they?

Why would they?

Why would they?

Clever. Very clever.

Seriously though,  why would they?

[South Dakota Democrat]

Why is Mayorkas so controversial compared to Biden's other nominees?

Explained above.

[South Dakota Democrat]

This could be the closest vote although it will still certainly pass.

If I recall, Education Secretary was also the closest nomination fight in the Trump administration. Murkowski and Collins broke ranks and voted no, leaving Pence to break the 50-50 tie - the first Cabinet tiebreaker vote in history if I remember correctly.

Any indication it's heading in that direction, or will Cardona end up picking up enough GOP support to get through comfortably?

No theres still a pretty decent chance he gets through at the usual 85-15, just found this interesting.

And yes Devos sadly was the most opposed due to the hate teacher unions have for her

She knew nothing about public education.

[South Dakota Democrat]

Like I've previously pointed out, though, the man has never cast a deciding vote against the Democratic Party line over the course of his nearly 10 years in the Senate. That's just not changing now.

well this aged well. Any comment?

Well, last I checked, I missed the part where he's confirmed to be casting a deciding vote against the Democratic Party line by taking this stand, so my comment would be to f**king wait:

Remember guys, Manchin literally never votes against the party line when it matters, and it's stupid and naive to think that he will. I'm sure that he's only doing this because he knows there are loads of Republicans to pad the margin.

(This is sarcastic in case you can't tell)

Y'all, can we calm the f**k down for literally 5 seconds & just wait & see how this plays out a bit more. It's entirely possible that he's been told Tanden has at least 1 Republican vote (so, literally pick 1 of your Romneys, Murkowskis, Collins', etc.) & that this is therefore not a time where his vote actually matters. But thank you for your failed attempt at a burn, though, very cool!

Maybe (I highly doubt it), but I do note that Manchin is announcing this ahead of any R publicly saying they're a yes.

The problem with Manchin is that we should not have to get down on our knees and beg Murkowski (here) or the Budget Committee (in the case of the budget amendments that he provided deciding votes for) to cover for his misbehavior. He should know enough to provide the desired result himself.

I'm honestly sick and tired of treating someone who voted with Trump more often than not, voted for 80% of his judges, and already has or plans to cast several deciding votes against the dems in this congress, as a Democrat. We need to kick him out of the caucus.

I was following until the last paragraph. How in God's name would deliberately making McConnell Majority Leader again just to teach Manchin a lesson or whatever be preferable to the current situation?

This Manchin majority simply isn't worth it. The biden nominees that have been confirmed would have been confirmed with or without his support, and he continually shows a lukewarm at best attitude toward the democratic agenda, including on covid related matters. At least with McConnell we'd know for sure that dem wins would be few, instead of getting all this false hope from closeted republican Joe Manchin.

Ok, this might objectively take the cake for being the worst take - on anything, ever - that I've ever seen on this forum.

[South Dakota Democrat]

Is it weird that I'm pissed at Manchin, but at the same time I don't really care about Tanden's nomination/think she's a sub-par pick/think it would be a good idea to have a different nominee anyway?

[South Dakota Democrat]

I wonder what the odds are that Manchin and Murkowski end up abstaining on Tanden, thus making it so she gets confirmed with a 49-49 vote. Murkowski ended up doing that with Kavanaugh...

IIRC, Murk voted no on Kavanaugh; I don’t think she abstained.

She abstained. She was opposed to the nomination,  but voted present because Steve Daines couldn't be there.

[South Dakota Democrat]

What are Tanden's chances now? This latest move by the Budget and Homeland Security committees doesn't seem like a great sign for her, although Biden's people are still behind her and seem unlikely to pull her nomination.

That's what they say publicly, but pretty sure they'll pull the nomination soon. Your mistake is taking what they say publicly at face value.

[South Dakota Democrat]

Granholm was confirmed.

64-35

[South Dakota Democrat]

Voting has begun on the Cardona nomination.

Confirmed 64-33

[South Dakota Democrat]

She neera-ly made it, but controversies sank her nomination.

I see what you did there.

[South Dakota Democrat]

Merrick Garland was just confirmed as Justice Minister.

It's called Attorney General.

I know.

But I call the office Justice Minister.

Ah, so you're just being wrong on-purpose. Thank you for so readily conceding that.

No.

I like to call the office like it is called in most countries: Minister for Justice.

We're specifically talking about the context of the United States.  So yes, you're being wrong. And stupid.

[South Dakota Democrat]

Murkowski, Sullivan, Collins, and Graham were the Republican yeas for Haaland. Who were the nine Senators who didn't vote?

Sen. John Barrasso (R-WY)
Sen. Michael Bennet (D-CO)
Sen. Bill Hagerty (R-TN)
Sen. John Hickenlooper (D-CO)
Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-HI)
Sen. Cynthia Lummis (R-WY)
Sen. Roger Marshall (R-KS)
Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL)
Sen. Pat Toomey (R-PA)

How is Hirono doing,  health wise?

[South Dakota Democrat]

Walsh confirmation vote for Minister of Labour set for 17:30 today.

That's not what it's called.

[South Dakota Democrat]

If you're just gonna make this conversation go round & round in circles, then it's not a conversation worth being had.

But it's literally a fact. USTR =/= Cabinet Secretary. VP =/= Cabinet Secretary.

But whatever, I'll leave it at that, we've had this convo a few times now. We're not going to agree with each other on this topic. So yeah, let's agree to disagree ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

If the premise of your point is correct,  though, what does Duckworth expect Biden to do about it now? All of the cabinet secretaries have been confirmed. Why didn't she do this earlier?

[South Dakota Democrat]

If the premise of your point is correct,  though, what does Duckworth expect Biden to do about it now? All of the cabinet secretaries have been confirmed. Why didn't she do this earlier?

Duckworth & Hirono want Biden to appoint some Asians to high-level governmental positions (like OMB, Deputy Cabinet positions, etc).

Also, like I mentioned earlier, lack of AAPI representation was pointed out to Biden BEFORE he finalized his Cabinet. The Congressional Asian Pacific Caucus, Hispanic Caucus and Black Caucus (known as the Tri-Caucus) released a statement to Biden on December 19th urging him to appoint an Asian Cabinet Secretary. Then, 100 Congress members sent a letter to Biden on December 29th urging him to appoint an AAPI Cabinet Secretary.


Here is the link to the statement: https://capac-chu.house.gov/press-release/tri-caucus-leaders-urge-president-elect-biden-nominate-aapi-cabinet-secretary

The letter: https://capac-chu.house.gov/press-release/over-100-members-congress-call-aapi-cabinet-secretary-president-biden%E2%80%99s-administration

Okay, but if your premise is that the VP and Cabinet level officials don't count,  then why would appointing more people of AAPI background to other positions that still aren't Cabinet secretaries be good enough?