Senate fight night

Ten hours of dilatory tactics led to fresh wrangling that spilled onto the Senate floor until the early morning hours Thursday and had the two parties warning that comity would need to be restored.

The fight, led by Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), came after Republicans voiced protests over the Senate’s inaction on stalled judicial nominees by forcing Senate clerks to read a 500-page amendment to a climate change bill, a process that started just before 1 p.m. Wednesday and stretched late into the night.

{mosads}GOP senators tried to press Reid to commit to confirming 15 appeals court nominees before the end of the Bush presidency — the historical average in the final two years of recent presidencies — but the majority leader stopped short of making such a promise.

Following the reading, the Senate voted on a motion to instruct the sergeant-at-arms to request the presence of absent senators into the chamber. The vote failed 27-28 but forced senators to return to the chamber for the late-night session. Reid then filed a parliamentary motion to end debate and limit amendments to the climate change bill, a move that sparked protests from Republicans.

Reid took the opportunity to lash out at McConnell for the stalling tactics and cited a memo from a GOP lobbyist that said the goal of the climate-change debate was to put the focus “much more on making political points than on amending the bill.”

“Mr. President, you couldn’t make anything up more cynical,” Reid said in an impassioned speech to the Democratic senators standing in the chamber.

Reid said that Democrats and White House chief of staff Joshua Bolten had reached a deal to move a package of executive branch nominees, but Senate Republicans were objecting to the package. McConnell later allowed the package to be approved by the Senate after assurances that the Judiciary Committee would take up three district court judges in the next “week or so.”

McConnell responded that Reid had backed away from earlier assurances to approve 15 circuit court nominees, and to hold confirmation votes for three of those nominees before the recent Memorial Day recess. The Senate only confirmed one nominee before Memorial Day — Steven Agee for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit — and eight this Congress.

"That commitment should be kept for the good of the institution," McConnell said.

McConnell warned that Democrats were setting a dangerous precedent that could come back to bite them if Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) wins the White House in November.

“I think the adults on the other side of the aisle [know] this is a precedent that ought not to be set,” McConnell said in an animated speech.

He complained about the lack of action on district court judges, lamenting, “Is there nothing we can agree on?” He said it would be up to him and Reid to “restore a certain level of comity to the chamber.”

Reid and Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) defended the progress on confirming President Bush's nominees, saying they have treated them much fairer than Republicans handled President Clinton's nominees in the late 1990s. He also criticized McConnell's concerns about not being allowed to offer amendments to the climate bill, saying the Republican stall tactics had forced him to shut down debate.

"I only point to how Orwellian these statements are," Reid said.

Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) later took to the floor and questioned whether Reid was committed to confirming the appeals court nominees.

“Is that the majority leader’s intention to reach the average?” Sessions asked.

In response, Reid said that comments Sessions made earlier the day that suggested he was “clueless” were a violation of rules of decorum in the chamber.

“That was really an insult,” Reid said. “I would ask my friend, did you really mean I was clueless?”

Sessions apologized, saying he got worked up in the heat of the debate.

“If I was violating a rule, and I was doing anything to insult the majority leader, I would apologize,” Sessions responded.

Reid said he would try to confirm the three nominees as he tried before the Memorial Day recess. He says that Republicans have delayed one of the appeals court nominees, impeding his efforts so far to reach that goal.

"I've learned here in the Senate to put the day behind you and move on to the next," Reid said at the end of the debate.

The Senate on Thursday will vote on a farm bill and an energy package.