Fresh off a devastating loss to Donald Trump, Vice President Kamala Harris will take to Capitol Hill to challenge him in her last big move in office.
As President Joe Biden seeks to develop a crush of judicial confirmations before leaving the White House, Democrats are bracing for the possibility of close calls in the process as they bid to surpass the 234 justices secured in Trump’s first term.
That’s where Harris comes in. As president of the Senate, Harris uses his constitutional authority to ensure a tie vote. A slim majority of Democrats resorted to this procedure under Harris Biden. broke the record last year for casting the most decisive vote of any vice president in history.
This is a very important issue for the president — and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y. — emerged last week when Harris and Biden met for lunch in their first meeting since the election, three sources with knowledge of the meeting said.
“It’s something they want to clear the decks for,” said a top Harris aide.
“He’ll definitely be up for any tie-breaking vote,” said a second senior aide.
“It’s a big focus,” said a third person familiar with the internal dynamics.
A vote is not expected to take place in the Senate until December, one of the sources said, when Harris left for Hawaii on Tuesday for a reprieve.
A top aide to Harris said the vice president had postponed a trip to California and Hawaii in case it was needed for a Senate vote to confirm the judges. Harris was supposed to leave this weekend, but instead left Tuesday with the intention of returning to D.C. for the necessary votes. That aide, as well as a person familiar with the planning, said the team doesn’t need him in D.C. right now, but expects a big battle over court nominees in December.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass. He said Tuesday that Harris was told he would be prepared to cut court ties if necessary. He would not say whether he had spoken to Harris about it in person.
“The goal is to fill every judicial nominee we can,” Warren said.
Schumer has made noises about going through those confirmations before Biden leaves office, according to several people with knowledge of the talks.
He announced that he would use the lame-duck session — the period between the election and the inauguration of a new president — to confirm more judges, as Republicans did in late 2020.
“We will use the lame duck to confirm the judges. “We will do our best to get as many judges to serve as possible, trying to remove the obstruction of the Republicans.” Schumer told NBC News in a recent interview.
It’s something that has already irked Trump, who has signaled that Republicans should block Democrats’ efforts to advance their judicial agenda.
“Democrats are trying to pack the Courts with Radical Left Judges on their way out the door. Republican senators must show up and hold the line — no more judges confirmed before Inauguration Day!” Trump Posted on Truth Social Tuesday.
But the Republicans – famously pushed back Trump’s Supreme Court Appointment The 2020 election is just one week away — you can’t stop it.
GOP senators could slow the process, but Democrats need a simple majority to clear any roadblocks and confirm judges. A senior Biden administration official who works on judicial nominees noted that in the lame-duck 2020 session, after Trump lost the election, Senate Republicans continued to confirm his judges.
Confirming more judges is a top priority for Schumer and Senate Democrats before handing over power to a new Congress, which will be controlled by Republicans in both chambers.
“We will confirm as many judges as possible on a lame duck,” said Sen. Mazie Hirono, D-Hawaii.
The standoff came to a head Monday after Democrats confirmed a judge to the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals. Schumer kept the Senate in session until nearly midnight, holding 18 more votes in six hours to give seven more confirmation votes to Biden’s picks later this week.
If they are all confirmed, it would bring Biden’s total to 223 federal judges.
That’s close to the final tally of 234 judges Trump confirmed in his first term, which Democrats tried to defeat after defeating him in the 2020 election. But this summer, Schumer stopped guaranteeing.
A Biden administration official said Trump’s number could be defeated, arguing that there are enough nominees on the calendar pending or awaiting committee consideration.
“We can cross 234,” the official said. “It’s not about beating Trump’s numbers. It’s about getting good people on the bench. Is 235 within the realm of possibility? it is so. But that’s not what drives him.”
At this time, the White House has not announced plans to nominate judges for other unfilled vacancies. This includes various openings in red states subject to a “blue slip” courtesy where local state Republican senators must sign off before being considered.
A senior administration official declined to discuss whether Biden had spoken to Harris or Schumer about the lame-duck endorsements.
“I am not going to enter into the negotiations conducted by the president,” said the official. “But you can safely assume that remains a matter of discussion and engagement.”
A Senate Democratic aide cheered the idea that Harris would be on the call to cut ties.
“I hope he doesn’t need it,” said the aide. “But I’m glad it’s an option now that the Dems are in the majority.”