Though Senate Republicans have long positioned themselves as rubber stamps for Donald Trump’s nominees, there have been infrequent exceptions over the course of the president’s five years in the White House. In early 2017, for example, Trump wanted fast-food executive Andrew Puzder to serve as the secretary of labor, but his Cabinet nomination ultimately collapsed in the face of bipartisan opposition.
Eight years later, the president nominated Puzder for a different position, and this time, GOP senators apparently put aside the concerns they had during Trump’s first term. The Hill reported:
Andrew Puzder, a former fast-food chain CEO, was confirmed by the Senate on Saturday as the U.S. ambassador to the European Union (EU). … President Trump picked Puzder as his selection for ambassador to the EU in January, praising him as steering fast-food chains like Carl’s Jr. and Hardee’s away from ‘serious financial difficulty’ and claiming Puzder would ‘do an excellent job’ as ambassador.
The final 53-44 confirmation vote fell largely along party lines, but not entirely: Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska voted against Puzder, while New Hampshire’s Democratic senators, Maggie Hassan and Jeanne Shaheen, voted with the GOP majority to confirm him.
But as Puzder prepares to relocate to Brussels, I’m struck by the familiarity of the circumstances.
A few weeks ahead of Puzder’s confirmation vote, Senate Republicans also voted to approve retired Army Brig. Gen. Anthony Tata to a leadership position at the Pentagon. In Trump’s first term, the president also nominated Tata to a senior DOD post; but after senators learned about Tata’s record as a radical conspiracy theorist — among other things, the retired general called Barack Obama a “terrorist leader” — his nomination collapsed.
In Trump’s second term, Senate Republicans — including ostensible “moderates” like Murkowski and Maine’s Susan Collins — confirmed him anyway.
Other first-term rejects have also landed on their feet recently. In 2018, officials in the Trump White House started receiving media calls about Darren Beattie, a speechwriter and policy aide at the time, and journalists wanted to know whether Beattie’s colleagues were aware of his role at a conference regularly attended by well-known white nationalists.
He was fired soon after, but he’s returned in Trump’s second term. Despite Beattie’s record of racism, the White House recently appointed him to lead the embattled U.S. Institute of Peace. Mark Green probably belongs on this list, too. Eight years ago, Trump tapped the Tennessee Republican to serve as secretary of the U.S. Army. But after Green’s radical worldview was exposed, some GOP senators felt compelled to raise concerns about his nomination, deeming him a bit too radical to be confirmed. On a Friday afternoon in May 2017, Green quietly withdrew from consideration. Green has not only made a comeback in Trump’s second term, the Republican also managed to climb the ranks on Capitol Hill, becoming the chair of the House Homeland Security Committee (before his unexpected resignation from Congress). No one should be surprised if this list keeps growing in the coming months.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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