Senate confirms eight Trump court picks in three days
The Hill, Dec 5, 2019

The Senate confirmed eight of President Trump's court picks this week, underscoring the rapid pace the GOP-controlled chamber has set on judicial nominations.

The confirmations came in back-to-back days with one district court nominee confirmed on Tuesday, five on Wednesday and two on Thursday.

The votes bring the total number of judicial confirmations for Trump to 170 nominations since taking office in January 2017.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) praised the picks on Thursday as the latest example of "impressive nominees" from Trump.

McConnell also defended his decision to dedicate weeks of floor time to judicial nominations, arguing that district court picks previously were able to clear the Senate without having to overcome time-consuming procedural hurdles.

"If our Democratic colleagues want to spend less time voting on district judges, they should take it up with the Democratic leader who is forcing us to take cloture vote after cloture vote," McConnell said.

Republicans changed the rules earlier this year to cut down on the amount of debate time district court nominees face. Under the change, once they overcome an initial procedural hurdle they can be confirmed after two additional hours of debate; before the rules change they faced an additional 30 hours of debate.


More: https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/4732...ks-in-three-day