butters
High on a Hill
- Joined
- Jul 2, 2009
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https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/poli...31&cvid=d89003ec960b403486bda190536b46f2&ei=6
The Senate circumvented a hold by Alabama Republican Sen. Tommy Tuberville on Thursday and confirmed Adm. Lisa Franchetti to lead the Navy, making her the first woman to be a Pentagon service chief and the first female member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Franchetti's historic confirmation as the chief of naval operations comes as Tuberville has drawn bipartisan criticism for holding up almost 400 military nominations in an effort to protest Pentagon abortion policy. In a remarkable display, several Republican senators angrily held the floor for more than four hours on Wednesday evening and called up 61 of the nominations for votes, praising each nominee for their military service. Tuberville showed no signs of letting up, standing and objecting to each one.
Franchetti, the vice chief of operations for the Navy, has broad command and executive experience. A surface warfare officer, she has commanded at all levels, heading U.S. 6th Fleet and U.S. Naval Forces Korea. She was the second woman to be promoted to four-star admiral, and she did multiple deployments, including as commander of a naval destroyer and two stints as aircraft carrier strike group commander.
Confronting Tuberville publicly for the first time since he announced the holds, the Republican senators — Alaska Sen. Dan Sullivan, Iowa Sen. Joni Ernst, South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, Indiana Sen. Todd Young and others — read lengthy biographies, praised nominees and lashed out at Tuberville as they called for vote after vote. They said they agree with the Alabama senator in opposing the abortion policy but questioned — as Democrats have for months — why he would hold up the highest ranks of the U.S. military.
the 'workaround' being considered by the Senate is in the form of a resolution to permit the quick confirmation of almost 400 officers en masse, a resolution brought by sinema and Reed...but it will take some time and probably require republican support in the Senate, which they may well receive given the growing anger at tuberville's blockage.As Wednesday night wore on, Sullivan, a colonel in the U.S. Marine Corps Reserve, and Ernst, a former commander in the U.S. Army Reserve and Iowa Army National Guard, continued to bring up new nominations and appeared to become increasingly frustrated. They noted that they were bringing up the nominations “one by one” as Tuberville had once called for, and they asked why he wouldn’t allow them to go forward. Tuberville did not answer.
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