Congress

How the Kavanaugh confirmation saga still haunts the Senate

Published

11 months ago

August 4, 2025

As the Senate prepared to vote last week to confirm Emil Bove to a lifetime seat on the Third Circuit Court of Appeals, one familiar name kept cropping up: Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

It will be seven years this October since senators confirmed Kavanaugh in the culmination of a politically fraught and highly emotional ordeal that tested personal beliefs and partisan loyalties. And while Bove’s confirmation process was nowhere near as explosive, Democrats and Republicans made comparisons to the Kavanaugh affair throughout.

Senate Judiciary Chair Chuck Grassley of Iowa accused Democrats of “dust[ing] off the playbook that they devised” for Kavanaugh in order to vilify Bove. Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, who is next in line to be the top Democrat on the committee in the next Congress, said Trump allies attempted to paper over ethical questions around Bove’s qualifications in the same way they shrugged off a sexual assault allegation against Kavanaugh.

“There’s a similarity here,” said Whitehouse. “[It] smells like political maneuver.”

It illustrates how one of the Senate’s most painful moments continues to haunt lawmakers — particularly those who sit on the Judiciary Committee, which has historically operated on a bipartisan basis at the frontlines of helping the legislative body fulfill its obligations to advise and consent.

“Kavanaugh has kinda become a verb,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), a senior member of the Judiciary panel whose defense of the Supreme Court nominee in 2018 catapulted him to conservative stardom.

At least three different whistleblowers came forward ahead of Bove’s confirmation vote with allegations against the nominee, who served as President Donald Trump’s former criminal defense attorney before becoming a senior Justice Department official. Democrats pressed Bove about his role in facilitating the dismissal of federal corruption charges against New York City mayor Eric Adams, and whether he suggested the administration ignore court orders that would undercut the president’s immigration agenda.

In Bove’s case, the allegations were markedly different from those lodged by Christine Blasey Ford against Kavanaugh, who she said sexually assaulted her in high school — an offense Kavanaugh unequivocally denied. But the tactics deployed by Democrats and Republicans in these cases mirror each other.

In the fights over Kavanaugh and Bove, Democrats and Republicans accused each other of acting in bad faith. With Bove, each party leveraged the other’s behavior during the Kavanaugh episode to undermine the opposite side’s credibility.

“I think it was an embarrassment to the Republicans, with Kavanaugh, that someone would come before us and literally tell her story under oath, a very credible presentation,” said the panel’s ranking member Dick Durbin of Illinois, who was a senior member of the panel when it considered Kavanaugh’s nomination. “I think the same thing is true of these whistleblowers.”

Blasey Ford’s allegations were submitted to Democrats long before they came to light, completely upending Kavanaugh’s anticipated glidepath to party-line confirmation. The new information forced the Judiciary Committee to regroup to hear testimony from Blasey Ford and hold another round of questioning for Kavanaugh.

Still, Democrats complained that Republicans, and the Trump administration, cut corners to expedite a final vote on Kavanaugh. Democrats, in Bove’s case, also accused Republicans of acting too hastily to confirm their nominee, including by refusing to hold an additional hearing with at least one of the whistleblowers who went public.

Conversely, Republicans accused Democrats of waiting until the immediate leadup to Bove’s scheduled confirmation vote to highlight potentially damaging claims against him.

“I felt like it was Kavanaugh-esque,” said Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.). “[The whistleblowers might have] thought at the eleventh hour, without time to complete due diligence, that maybe they could get through.”

Tillis, who is not running for reelection, had previously announced he would oppose nominees who expressed support for the attack on the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021; Bove was involved in the dismissal of prosecutors who worked on DOJ cases tied to the attack and advised on White House pardons of the rioters. Tillis was seen as a potential “no” vote who might have blocked Bove from being reported favorably out of the Judiciary Committee; he ended up voting “yes.”

“When you call everyone corrupt, nobody’s corrupt; when the Democrats bring forward whistleblowers every other Thursday, coincidentally just before the vote … to confirm somebody that they oppose, people just tend not to pay attention to the whistleblowers,” said Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.). “The last minute whistleblowers look contrived and are getting old.”

Ultimately, Bove was confirmed last week in a narrow 50-49 vote, over objections from two Republicans, Sens. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Susan Collins of Maine. Notably, neither of them formally opposed Kavanaugh on the Senate floor, with Collins deciding to support him and Murkowski voting “present.”

As the shadow of the Kavanaugh saga lingered over the Bove proceedings, it’s possible the bad feelings between the two parties from both episodes will continue to worsen: Democrats are already bracing for the possibility that Trump could be in a position to appoint another justice on the Supreme Court if a vacancy occurs, which would set up another monumental political battle.

And while the confirmation of conservative jurists was a key pillar of Trump’s first term, Trump is making clear that, in his second term, loyalty is the driving factor in his selection process, said Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.).

Trump is also now pressuring Grassley to abandon the practice of allowing home state senators to effectively veto potential U.S. attorneys or district court judges for their own state, and Senate GOP leadership is considering changing the chamber’s rules in the fall to speed up the process for confirming some nominees. Both would further shake up institutional precedent just as Democrats say the Kavanaugh and Bove cases challenged the status quo.

“I do think that the sense of frustration and even anger has become more pronounced simply because there are so many rules and norms that they are defying and disregarding without even a pretense of fairness,” Blumenthal, a member of the Judiciary Committee, said of the chamber’s judicial confirmation process.

“I think the partisan divide may have deepened somewhat,” he continued. “The issue is the same –that is, the denial of a full and fair investigation of the nominee, whether it was Kavanaugh or Bove.”

Congress

Trump calls on House GOP hard-liners to end floor blockade

Published

16 minutes ago

June 25, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

President Donald Trump instructed a band of his GOP hard-liner allies to end their House floor blockade with multiple major bills at risk of being derailed.

“House Republicans should unify, and stop voting down ‘Rules’ or, threatening to do so,” Trump posted after meeting with Speaker Mike Johnson Thursday. He added: “No more grandstanding, please!”

“Rules” are procedural measures used by House leaders to control the chamber floor. Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.) and her allies said this week they would vote down those measures until the Senate passes the SAVE America Act, the stalled GOP elections bill.

Trump has embraced hardball tactics to advance SAVE America Act himself — including by refusing to sign a bipartisan housing bill this week. But Luna’s floor blockade has risked collateral damage, including passage of fiscal 2027 appropriations bills and the annual Pentagon policy bill.

Asked about Trump’s post, Luna said she has filed an amendment to the defense bill that would attach the elections bill. Doing so would almost certainly kill its chances of passing in the Senate, where Democrats could filibuster the bill.

The House Rules Committee is set to meet Monday to consider amendments and prepare the bill for the floor.

Trump, meanwhile, did not address the housing bill he refused to sign this week, but Johnson said in brief comments to reporters after returning from the White House that he intended to send the measure to Trump. That would set up a signature, a veto or passive enactment of the bill if it is not signed within 10 days.

“We’re on exactly the same page,” Johnson said. “Congress has work to do, and that’s what we’re going to do.”

Congress

Democrats have some rare praise for Trump’s DHS chief at hearing

Published

1 hour ago

June 25, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin received praise from an unexpected corner of the House on Thursday: Democratic appropriators tasked with funding his department.

At an oversight hearing for the Department of Homeland Security, Rep. Ed Case of Hawaii, along with Texas Reps. Henry Cuellar and Veronica Escobar, thanked Mullin for an improved culture of communication and engagement between the department and Capitol Hill.

Escobar noted that she recently had “a really great meeting” with Mullin.

“I so appreciated your openness to hearing me out and hearing out the concerns that I brought to you,” she explained. Escobar also praised Immigration and Customs Enforcement chief David Venturella for “exhibiting that same openness” during a recent visit to El Paso.

Cuellar, the top Democrat on the Homeland Security Appropriations subcommittee, noted that border czar Tom Homan and other senior officials were in his district recently and that he was glad to be getting “notifications before” officials visited now “instead of hearing that from my mayor and other folks.”

Those same Democrats did question the DHS chief on the installation of fencing in sensitive areas along the U.S.-Mexico border and conditions at immigration detention facilities. Still, they maintained a fairly convivial tone with the previous senator and House member from Oklahoma.

While some Democrats in the hearing did have sharp words for Mullin, his relatively warm reception is notable given the hostile reaction from Democrats that Mullin’s predecessor, former Secretary Kristi Noem, received in her appearances on Capitol Hill. Democrats lashed Noem during hearings, calling for her resignation or firing over a litany of policy disagreements — from the tone and tenor of immigration enforcement to controversial spending decisions Democrats and some Republicans characterized as self-indulgent and self-serving.

Mullin had pledged to mend fences with Capitol Hill and work with both Republicans and Democrats, a promise that had prompted skepticism from prominent Democratic lawmakers. The hearing suggested that some improvements to the relationship have materialized.

Reps. Lauren Underwood of Illinois and Rosa DeLauro of Connecticut, the top Democrat on the full Appropriations Committee, were less diplomatic. They clashed with Mullin over conditions in immigration detention facilities and the Trump administration’s plans for the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

The exchanges, in which Mullin shouted back at the members and accused them of lying about the department and approaching the Trump administration with a double standard, were sufficiently unruly that Rep. Mark Amodei (R-Nev.) intervened and scolded both the members and the Homeland Security secretary.

Still, the mostly friendly environment allowed Mullin to speak more at length about his policy approaches on a litany of issues in the face of questions from both Democrats and Republicans.

On immigration enforcement, Mullin pledged that his department was reviewing decisions under his predecessor to acquire warehouses for use in housing unauthorized immigrants in ICE custody, acknowledging to Escobar there are “some that we’re trying to make work, but there was some due diligence that maybe wasn’t actually checked off.”

Mullin also explained that the large tranche of funds Congress allocated to DHS via reconciliation allows the department to “set out missions and force ourselves to look at technology today, not just what we can spend in a fiscal year.” He specified that those funds are already providing for investments at ports of entry to handle foreign trade and keeping DHS’ operations stable.

And he pledged to address a complaint from early in the Trump administration: that staffing levels at the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency are too low. Mullin argued that there needed to be measured increases to the agency’s currently low staffing.

“Do we need to hire everybody back? No. Do we need to hire about 600 people back? Yes, but I don’t want to put bodies in position. I want to put the talented individuals that know what they’re doing and have partnerships with our state and local officials,” he explained.

Mullin also spoke positively about his engagements with Democratic officials. In an exchange with Case, Mullin lavished praise on Hawaii’s Democratic governor, Josh Green, saying Green “has been very helpful.” Green, he explained, “reports to us when some governors don’t” and called his approach to DHS “key to getting this done.”

Case told Mullin: “I’m texting him as we speak to say that you’re saying nice things about him.”

Mullin joked back: “Don’t say it. Don’t publish it.”

Congress

A district that went +20 for Trump now in play for Democrats

Published

1 hour ago

June 25, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

NEW YORK — A new internal poll shows a Democratic House candidate is in a dead heat with his Republican challenger in an upstate New York district President Donald Trump won by 20 points in 2024.

The poll, commissioned by Democratic candidate Blake Gendebien’s campaign and conducted by the left-leaning group Impact Research, found Gendebien trailing Republican Anthony Constantino by just one percentage point, 45-44, with 11 percent of voters undecided.

The district is currently represented by outgoing Republican Rep. Elise Stefanik, who congratulated Constantino on winning the GOP nomination Tuesday after he defeated Republican state Assemblymember Robert Smullen in a nasty primary.

Constantino, the CEO of a sticker company who’s self-funding his campaign with $10 million, earned Trump’s endorsement in April, a blow that proved fatal for Smullen’s primary campaign.

Constantino is an eccentric and passionate supporter of the president and recently recorded an adulatory rap album titled “Thank You President Trump.”

During the primary, he left a threatening voicemail to a constituent in the district, threatened to sue his opponent, whom he referred to as “Slimebob,” and frequently touted the 100-foot-wide Trump sign on top of his Sticker Mule factory, which he erected during Trump’s 2024 campaign. Constantino is also a former boxer.

Luke Martin, a pollster from Impact Research who works for the Gendebien campaign, said the campaign watched the primary in hopes they would face the polarizing Constantino.

“Our research has always shown that a wannabe DC insider like Constantino is very beatable in NY-21, but his rapidly increasing negatives had us concerned that we might lose our shot to run against him if he couldn’t keep it together through the primary,” Martin said in a statement. “The more money he spent, the more we saw his unfavorability tick up in our polls. The data was always clear that Robert Smullen would have been a more competitive Republican candidate for this district.”

Anthony Constantino, a Republican candidate for Congress, stands in front of a

After respondents received messaging on the two candidates, Gendebien, a dairy farmer, climbed ahead of Constantino, 49-40, with 11 percent still undecided. The poll quizzed 500 likely general election voters from May 26-31 and had a margin of error of plus-or-minus 4.4 percent.

Forty percent of those surveyed said they voted for Kamala Harris in the 2024 presidential election, and 58 percent said they voted for Trump. Twenty-three percent of respondents identified as Democrat, 27 percent said they were independents and 46 percent identified as Republicans.

There has been no independent polling of the district, which is one of the largest in the northeast and stretches from the northern Catskills region to the Canadian border. Trump won the district with 60 percent of the vote.

A potential curveball in the general election is whether Smullen, a retired Marine colonel, will continue to run for the seat despite losing the Republican primary. Smullen, who has the backing of the state’s Conservative Party, is on its ballot line in November. That would set up a three-way contest between him, Gendebien and Constantino.

Smullen has not ruled out running as a Conservative Party candidate. He has until Friday, July 3 to decline the ballot line.

Another potential factor to Smullen’s decision making is that the Conservative Party’s chair, Jerry Kassar, is in a bitter, personal feud with Constantino. Kassar is suing Constantino for defamation after Constantino said Kassar threatened to kill him. Kassar told Blue Light News it’s up to Smullen whether or not he wants to run on the Conservative line.

“The party itself has no role whatsoever, until an action is taken by the candidate,” Kassar said. “Bob has not indicated to me anything other than what has been public, which is that he’s interested in staying on but is thinking it through and will make a final decision soon.”

Gendebien’s campaign declined to release survey data on a three-way race.

Blake Gendebien testifies before a Senate subcommittee in May 2023.

Battleground New York, which works to flip competitive House seats by engaging disaffected voters, said the bruising Smullen-Constantino primary has put Democrats in a winning position.

“With Democrats surging and the race already tied, Republicans in NY-21 couldn’t afford a messy primary and they got one anyway,” said Andrew Grossman, a spokesperson for the group. “They spent the entire primary proving they can’t stand each other, and now they’ve handed voters a November ballot where they can choose between the guy the party hates and the guy the nominee hates.”