Senate Judiciary Chairman Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) said he wants his home state’s senators to eliminate controversial judicial nominees as former President Trump’s chances of re-election in November increase. He indicated his intention to discuss restoring the Senate’s past norm of granting approval. It becomes clearer.
Among the recent Judiciary Committee increases, Durbin said the failure to prevent certain state and local circuit court judge nominees from advancing due to a lack of consideration of “blue slips,” or approval or disapproval. This was in response to Republican dissatisfaction. Local state senator.
This informal tool was regularly honored by committee chairs for decades until the ritual was no longer offered in 2017.
Durbin said last week that he is “ready to begin this conversation and dialogue on a bipartisan basis.”
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Senator Dick Durbin, pictured in the top inset, favors reinstatement of the blue slip rule as former President Trump may return to the White House and the next presidential election remains a close one. He said he was positive. (Getty Images, iStock)
“If you’re going to do something with a blue return for a circuit court judge, I think there’s one premise: the outcome of an election that may or may not change the presidency,” he said. I don’t know, but we should do it proactively.”
Amid renewed debate over blue tax returns, some argue that Democrats are concerned about how judicial nominations will fare under President Trump’s new term. Mike Davis, former chief nominating adviser to former Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), called the idea “nonsense.”
“Mr. Durbin is concerned that Mr. Trump will take back the White House in November and that the Republicans will take back the Senate,” he said.
“On the surface, it appears that Democrats are preparing to lose the majority and the White House,” said former chief press secretary to Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott and chief of staff for the Senate Republican Conference. Republican strategist Ron Bonjean says: It’s an “insurance certificate”.
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Sen. Dick Durbin agreed to discuss the blue return rule. (Tom Williams Pool/Getty Images)
Durbin did not respond to Fox News Digital for comment.
As chairman, Grassley broke with a long-standing practice during the Trump administration of honoring the blue returns of his fellow senators. In 2017, he advanced his confirmation hearing to the Court of Appeals over the objections of then-Sen. Al Franken, Democrat.
Grassley suggested at the time that Democrats were using the blue slip rule in place of the filibuster, not because of any serious concerns.
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The Iowa senator, who is expected to return to chair the Judiciary Committee if Republicans win a majority in November, may not be as interested in reinstating the rule as other Republicans.
“The blue return process is not a rule, but a courtesy extended at the discretion of the Judiciary Chairman,” a Grassley spokesperson said.
“The vast majority of presiding officers over the past century have allowed circuit court nominees to be heard without the return of blue slips,” the spokesperson added.
Senator Chuck Grassley has stopped respecting blue slips, calling them a courtesy. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)
Carrie Severino, president of the Judicial Crisis Network, similarly said the rule “is not an absolute bar to considering candidates.”
“There are people who are trying to make this the norm more than ever,” she argued. “It’s just a couple. [of] The chairman of the Historical Judiciary Committee actually handled this very harshly.[ly]. ”
Ryan Owens, a political science professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said the decision “highlights the uncertainty leading up to the election and the potential weakening of the Democratic Party. Who will hold the White House in 2025?” is opaque.”
He said that Durbin’s intention to consider re-enacting the rule means that, although his party is limping into the election, he recognizes that there is a good chance that Trump will win. It seems that they are doing so.”
“If Durbin’s proposal is accepted, it could help Democrats delay President Trump’s inauguration,” he said.
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Sen. Thom Tillis warned his colleagues that they could be in the same position with a new administration. (Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
Sen. Thom Tillis, RN.C., urged Democratic lawmakers to support reinstating the rule and to hold on to the serious concerns expressed by local state senators during the price increases. “I think most Democrats realize that if the election were held today, Donald J. Trump would be president,” he said, adding that Republicans could win a majority in the Senate. I explained that there is.
“And they don’t give us any incentive to look out for them when the tables turn next year,” he said.
There is significant disagreement between Democratic and Republican senators over who and which party is to blame for the rule being broken. Democrats point to Grassley’s moves on circuit court nominees, but Republicans believe that trajectory began years ago.
Senate Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Lindsey Graham, R.S.C., said former Democratic leader Sen. Harry Reid charted such a trajectory when he lifted the filibuster on most executive nominations. I asked my colleagues if they could at least agree with that.
However, Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (DR.I.) refused to agree. “No, I think the blue slip is something else entirely,” he insisted.
Mr. Tillis stressed to other committee members that Mr. Reed’s actions and Mr. Grassley’s actions were “intrinsically related.”
In fact, Tillis said in an interview with FOX News Digital that the trigger was really what happened in 2003. “Chuck Schumer made a conscious choice to break away from Senate norms and start using the filibuster to tie up judges,” he said. He said.
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Sen. Chuck Schumer is notable for beginning to use the then-current filibuster to block judicial nominees who had majority support.
“Senate Republicans stopped blue-filing circuit court nominations under President Donald Trump,” a spokesperson for New York’s majority leader told Fox News Digital, referring to Grassley’s decision.
Despite bipartisan interest, “it seems unlikely that a solution will be reached before the election,” Bonjean said of the fate of a blueslip revival.
“Politicians are always skeptical of ‘ceasefire’ proposals put forward by weaker parties,” Owens said.
