Stalling of Cabinet appointments inevitable

OPINION:

What goes around comes around, and never more often than in the partisan games politicians play. Sen. Charles Schumer of New York, the new leader of the Democrats in the U.S. Senate, is determined to put a quick finish to whatever honeymoon Donald Trump may get when he becomes the president two weeks hence.

To do that, Mr. Schumer wants to make it as difficult as possible to confirm Mr. Trump’s nominees for his Cabinet and other senior positions in the new administration. This might ordinarily invite use of the filibuster as the ultimate weapon, to delay and frustrate the new president until he gives up and withdraws the nomination and seeks someone suitable to the opposition.

With Mr. Schumer’s help, Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada, the leader of the Democratic majority in the 113th Congress, tweaked the Senate rules to make it difficult for the minority Republicans to block Barack Obama’s nominations to senior positions in his administration. The filibuster was retired to the Senate armory.

Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the leader of the Republican majority in the new Congress, intends to leave the Reid/Schumer rules in place, so that the Democrats can’t use the filibuster to scuttle the Trump nominations. Mr. Schumer is thus hoist on his own petard. He is using a different strategy, making unreasonable requests for information, demands for extensive hearings to enable special-interest groups to throw mud pies at the nominees, and demands for lengthy confirmation hearings.

Mr. Trump is assembling what appears to be a team of qualified, experienced senior advisers that rivals any in recent memory. Absent alarming disclosures, there’s little reason why any of them should not be on track for confirmation soon.

Mr. Schumer is counting on departments and agencies being left leaderless, to be administered by partisan Democratic caretakers appointed by President Obama’s administration. This is what happened when the Clinton administration had so much trouble, and delay, in getting an attorney general in place two decades ago.

This is partisanship at its worst. Mr. Schumer is playing to the liberal, or progressive, wing of his party and its billionaire donors at the expense of the country and the wishes of the American people.

Mr. Trump won the election and with it the right to appoint the team he wants. The Senate, of both Democrats and Republicans, is charged by the Constitution to “advise and consent” to the president’s appointments, and reject a nominee who is manifestly unqualified.

But stalling the inevitable — and delay in untangling gridlock — is not what the people voted for in November. They voted for change, and a new way of doing things, and Mr. Schumer and his regiments of sore losers, each armed with a monkey wrench to throw into the works, are determined to keep things the sorry way they are. But it’s a losing game.