Grassley Says Delaying New Senate Confirmations an Option After Cordray [View all]

[Purveyor]

By Laura Litvan - Tue Jan 10 18:36:44 GMT 2012

Senate Republicans should consider blocking future presidential nominations as a response to President Barack Obama’s disputed recess appointments last week, said Senator Charles Grassley, an Iowa Republican.

Grassley, the top Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, said today he prefers first seeking some Senate Democrats to join in a public pushback to Obama’s four recess appointments Jan. 4, including the installation of Richard Cordray as the new director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Short of that, Grassley said, Republicans may have to go it alone with tough actions that could include holding up pending nominations from a Senate confirmation vote.

“We have got to stand our ground,” Grassley said in an interview. “You can’t let a president who takes an oath to uphold the Constitution go around the Constitution. That’s what the checks and balances are.”

Senate Republicans have criticized Obama’s decision to appoint Cordray as well as three members to the National Labor Relations Board while the Senate was on a break. So far the Republicans have said little about whether they might retaliate. Don Stewart, a spokesman for Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, said his office doesn’t have “any announcements” about what effect Obama’s move will have on pending nominations and any other business before the Senate.

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http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-01-10/grassley-says-delaying-new-senate-confirmations-an-option-after-cordray.html