Dems dig in as GOP prepares to go nuclear in Trump nominee race

Senate Democrats are deeply entrenched in their blockade of President Donald Trump’s nominees as Senate Republicans inch closer to going nuclear in the upper chamber.

Republicans are expected to use the “nuclear option” on Thursday and will change the Senate’s rules using a modified Democratic proposal to clear the growing backlog of Trump’s nominees. But Democrats, led by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., are standing firm in their resistance.

THUNE LAYS GROUNDWORK FOR NUCLEAR OPTION IN SENATE FIGHT OVER TRUMP NOMINEES

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., railed against the Schumer-led logjam and charged that Senate Democrats were blocking nominees from voice votes or unanimous consent – two fast-track processes typically used to move non-controversial nominees – because of “Trump derangement syndrome.”

“That’s got to change,” Thune said. “This is a problem the Democrats created, and we intend to fix it.”

Thune teed up 48 nominees, all sub-Cabinet level positions that advanced out of committee on a bipartisan basis, for Thursday’s vote. Senate Democrats still have the option to vote on the tranche of Trump’s picks and avoid a nuclear change, but that outcome is unlikely.

Instead, Schumer offered for Republicans to again resume negotiations that were derailed last month when Trump intervened and told the Democratic leader to “GO TO HELL” over “egregious and unprecedented” demands for a deal on a nominee package.

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“I say to my Republican colleagues to think carefully before taking this step. If you go nuclear, it’s going to be a decision you will come to regret,” Schumer said.

Republicans are moving forward with a modified version of a bill originally introduced by Sens. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., Angus King, I-Maine, and former Sen. Ben Cardin, D-Md., that would allow for nominees to be confirmed in groups, or en bloc.

SENATE GOP READY TO GO NUCLEAR AFTER SCHUMER’S ‘POLITICAL EXTORTION’ OF NOMINEES

Democrats showed their willingness to continue the blockade throughout the week, including when Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, attempted to tee up 10 judicial nominees for unanimous consent to avoid being sent back to committee through an arcane Seante procedure, but was promptly blocked by Schumer.

“This blanket obstruction of all nominees is a misguided attempt to score political points,” Grassley said.

Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, told Fox News Digital that Republicans haven’t shown a desire to return to the table since negotiations were blown up last month. He said that using a Democratic proposal “gives them a talking point they can lean on,” but he said Senate Democrats weren’t falling for it.

“They’ve decided they lost patience, and using someone else’s bill as cover doesn’t really do the trick,” he said.

Indeed, Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, offered the original Klobuchar bill on the floor Wednesday night, but the move was blocked by Sen. Alex Padilla, D-Calif., who instead offered to modify the proposal to kick in later in 2029, when Trump will be out of office.

And King, one of the original co-sponsors of the bill, told Fox News Digital that he couldn’t support his legislation coming back to benefit the Trump administration.

“No, it’s a different, whole different situation than it was,” King said. “I could not support anything that facilitated this president’s stocking of the federal government.”