Senate Republicans batch-confirm 48 Trump nominees after nuclear option

The nuclear option refers to changing Senate rules by simple majority vote. It bypasses the 60-vote supermajority threshold that historically protected the minority party from unlimited majority power.

Harry Reid (D-NV) invoked it Nov. 21, 2013, eliminating the 60-vote threshold for most judicial and executive branch nominations. He exempted Supreme Court nominees at the time, thinking that protection would hold.

Reid cited 79 Republican filibusters of Obama nominees in five years as justification. This compared to 68 total filibusters for all previous presidents combined, showing unprecedented obstruction.

Three Democrats voted against Reid's 2013 nuclear option: Carl Levin of 🚗Michigan, JMJoe Manchin of ⛰️West Virginia, and Mark Pryor of 💎Arkansas. Manchin became the only senator to oppose all three deployments.

MMMitch McConnell (R-KY) extended it to Supreme Court nominees Apr. 6, 2017. This enabled confirmation of Neil Gorsuch (54 votes), Brett Kavanaugh (50 votes), and Amy Coney Barrett (52 votes) without Democratic support.

John Thune (R-SD) deployed it Sep. 11, 2025, to create a new batch confirmation rule. This allows unlimited sub-Cabinet and ambassador nominees to be confirmed en bloc without individual debate.

The first batch on Sep. 18, 2025, confirmed 48 nominees including KGKimberly Guilfoyle (ambassador to Greece), CGCallista Gingrich (ambassador to Switzerland and Liechtenstein), and BWBrandon Williams (undersecretary for nuclear security).

Batch confirmation requires only 2 hours of Senate debate total—not per nominee—and a simple majority vote. This completely eliminates individual scrutiny that previously allowed senators to question appointee qualifications.

Average Senate confirmation time jumped from 49 days to 193 days across six recent presidential administrations. Yet neither party addressed partisan obstruction as the root cause. Both chose to eliminate the 60-vote threshold instead.

Over 1,340 presidential appointees require Senate confirmation annually. Future presidents whose party controls the Senate will now use batch confirmations as standard practice, permanently altering Senate procedure.