Blocking Trump Nominees is Up to Us

Published with the generous permission of Amee Vanderpool. For more of Amee's work, visit her Shero newsletter.

By Amee Vanderpool

Donald Trump’s transition team confirmed during the first few days of December that Trump had finally signed the vetting agreement with the Department of Justice that enabled the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to conduct background checks on the people he intends to nominate to senior positions in his Presidential Cabinet. For weeks, Trump held out on moving forward with any kind of traditional background investigation, as a proposal circulated by his legal advisor, Boris Epshteyn made the rounds among his top advisors, while Trump considered bypassing the FBI with private investigators who were loyal to his agenda. 

Under this proposed Epshteyn plan, Trump would use his presidential power to grant security clearances to his appointees after his inauguration, and then retain complete control over the vetting materials before the Senate held hearings on his more prominent nominees. By utilizing this “legal work-around,” Trump would be able to install people with questionable backgrounds into positions with high security clearances, and then let the Senate pick those nominees apart in hearings after the fact. 

In the past, presidential candidates have signed transition agreements before the election, working in concert with the current administration to ensure a complete and timely investigation. Trump delayed the process by over a month, wasting time to haggle over provisions that could ultimately produce warnings for some of his nominees, who have already had a cursory vetting through online social media. 

Starting in January, the incoming Trump administration will have to fill 4,000 political positions in the federal government. More than 1,000 of these positions — including cabinet secretaries and agency heads, deputy secretaries, assistant secretaries, and ambassadors — require Senate confirmation.
Considering that candidates for senior positions in previous administrations, including the first Trump administration, had to submit to a complete review of their political, financial, and personal backgrounds before the announcement of a nomination or appointment, it is safe to assume that Trump will be bypassing several traditional protocols which would hinder the success of his nominees.

We can expect that the Trump transition team will continue to “overlook” many of these traditional rules, which are not necessarily enforceable by the legislative branch, as there is a rush to move his nominees quickly through the process before the American people have time to notice what is happening. One thing is painfully clear now: we can’t rely on the main stream media to alert us to anything critical or to properly reflect the electorate’s outrage at a political decision. 

Senator Roger Wicker (R-MS), who leads the Senate Armed Services Committee, will hold Pete Hegseth’s confirmation hearing for US Defense Secretary on January 14, before Donald Trump is even inaugurated. Another controversial hearing, for former Representative Tulsi Gabbard, who has been nominated for US Director of National Intelligence, is also set to take place next week by the Senate Intelligence Committee. 

While we don’t have all of the information at this point that would stem from a thorough FBI’s vetting process for all of Trump’s picks, there are critical issues with several Trump nominees. Tusli Gabbard who has been publicly sympathetic to autocrats like Russia’s Vladimir Putin, and who took a secret trip to visit Syria’s Bashar al-Assad, will be questioned about her allegiances and security stances. Kash Patel, Trump’s nominee for Director of the FBI, is also expected to be heavily scrutinized for his lack of experience and for his record on national security issues. 

Pete Hegseth will have to answer serious questions about his inappropriate drinking, a past allegation of sexual assault, and his previous comments opposing women in combat roles. Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Trump’s nominee for US Health and Human Services Secretary, will likely draw questions from both sides of the political aisle for his views on abortion, vaccines and food policy.

It is important to note that Presidential Cabinet Nominees are rarely rejected by the Senate — the last time the Senate voted down a Cabinet nominee was in 1989, when senators rejected George H.W. Bush’s nominee for defense secretary, John Tower, due to concerns about his drinking. Tower was the subject of an FBI investigation into drinking and sexual harassment as part of his security clearance check, at a time when Republicans were still able to acknowledge that national security was sacrosanct. We would have no problem if those same conservative standards were being applied to all Trump nominees now. 

Ultimately, Republicans hold a slim advantage in the US Senate, as the threshold vote for confirming a president’s nominee has been lowered to a simple majority. While this might feel like an insurmountable problem for the everyday citizen who opposes any of Donald Trump’s nominees, there is a way to ensure that each nominee is accurately scrutinized and held to a higher standard than Trump would prefer. What will move the dial on opposition to an appointee like Pete Hegseth, is if each and every person of voting age pays attention to the hearings and makes their opposition known to their US Senators in the most productive way.

It may sound naive, but I promise you — the way to stop these nominees is to openly and pointedly voice credible opposition to your US Senators, by calling their offices directly in your home state, to politely but firmly express your opinion, and ask that they not confirm that nominee. When you call your senator at their home office, a staffer MUST log the call and must respond to your request, usually in writing, within a certain amount of time. 

Defeating a bad Trump nominee is not an impossible task — it is how the American people saved the Affordable Care Act (ACA) when Republicans held a majority, and through public pressure, were unable to garner the necessary number of conservative votes to strike down the law (rest in peace, John McCain). Public opinion and the power of its sway is also the reason Matt Gaetz withdrew his name for consideration as US Attorney General weeks ago. 

Do not underestimate the power of millions of Americans, speaking out at once, in a productive and thoughtful way, to shift the dial on where a politician might stand politically or how they might be willing to vote. Elected officials know that their future rests with the voters and the ability to get re-elected (we see you, Kyrsten Sinema) and this fear of mass kickback is a very real warning sign for any sitting Senator. 

The key to calling your US Senators is to ensure that you are calling the local office in your home state first, where you can get the phone number immediately with any Google search, as this is the call that will likely force the Senator’s office to respond to your objection. Next, you will need to call the Senate switchboard at (202) 224-3121, and leave voicemails for your senators. Then, you need to lodge a complaint online by going to your Senator’s webpage. Lastly, you should use all of your social media accounts to embolden others to do the same things listed above and remember: posts about rejecting Trump nominees will not necessarily move the dial, but thousands of people calling in will make an impact.

This is a critical time for each and every concerned American to stay involved and to keep fighting. While these nominations are concerning, and deserve much more scrutiny over the next few weeks, this is also a great chance for us to gauge how successful we can be in resisting the Trump administration and see where we stand at this point in terms of political activism, something that will be essential in the next few years. Consider the coming weeks to be a very important practice run for the proper functioning of our American Democracy as we assess what tools we have as citizens to fight back. Please join me.