Might have been nice to get this ball rolling back in January, certainly. But holding up Presidential appointments is a classic stall tactic that has routinely forced Presidents to come to the negotiating table.
Will it work this time? Probably not, because Trump seems content to just do whatever he wants in defiance of law. Is there anything a legislator can do about that (shy of Ides of March style legislating)? Not without buy-in from the legislative majority and the executive bureaucracy (which has already been gutted and filled in with loyalists).
Which is why he’d have done well to block appointments Day 1, rather than let the cabinet fill up with fascists over hand-wave objections.
:house on fire, 5-alarm:
Blumenthal: “I’ll now start throwing some sand at the house to help.”
This feels like too little too late.
Might have been nice to get this ball rolling back in January, certainly. But holding up Presidential appointments is a classic stall tactic that has routinely forced Presidents to come to the negotiating table.
Will it work this time? Probably not, because Trump seems content to just do whatever he wants in defiance of law. Is there anything a legislator can do about that (shy of Ides of March style legislating)? Not without buy-in from the legislative majority and the executive bureaucracy (which has already been gutted and filled in with loyalists).
Which is why he’d have done well to block appointments Day 1, rather than let the cabinet fill up with fascists over hand-wave objections.