Panel’s 26-1 vote backs Mattis for defense
WASHINGTON — The Senate Armed Services Committee voted Wednesday to approve Donald Trump’s pick for defense secretary, clearing the way for retired Marine Gen. James Mattis to be confirmed shortly after the president-elect is sworn in.
The Republican-led panel’s vote came the same day as the other Senate committees heard from more of Trump’s nominees.
On a vote of 26-1, the armed services panel bypassed a procedural hurdle, agreeing that Mattis’ nomination should be sent to the full Senate for consideration instead of first being referred to the committee. Although Trump selected Mattis last month, he can’t formally nominate him until after
Trump’s inaugurated Friday.
Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., cast the lone vote against Mattis. Gillibrand opposed Mattis from the start because she said his appointment undermined the principle of civilian control of the military.
Congress last week approved legislation that grants a one- time exception for Mattis from the law that bars former service members who have been out of uniform for less than seven years from holding the top Pentagon job. The restriction is meant to preserve civilian control of the military.
Mattis retired from military service in 2013 after a 41-year career in uniform.
Confirmation of Mattis by the GOP-led Senate is virtually certain. The legislation granting the exception cleared the Senate 81-17. Thirty Democrats backed the bill, suggesting they’ll also vote to confirm him.
Elsewhere in the Capitol, South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, up for United Nations ambassador, departed sharply from the president-elect on a range of foreign-policy issues. Meanwhile, Rep. Tom Price, R-Ga., the nominee for health and human services secretary, promised the Sen- ate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee that the new administration won’t “pull the rug out” from under those covered by the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.
Haley, appearing before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, voiced skepticism about Russia and optimism about NATO. She also unequivocally shot down the idea of a Muslim registry or ban.
Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., put her on the spot, noting that on some matters Trump has outlined a global approach that is “the exact opposite of what you are articulating it to be.”
Trump already has modified some positions, and more changes are likely once Trump is in office, she said.
“Not all of it will change after Friday, but I will control the part of it I can” at the United Nations, she said.
Haley framed the disagreements as a positive development.
“That’s how an administration works, you surround yourself with people who don’t just say ‘yes’ to what you think,” she said.
She pledged to forcefully advance American interests at the U.N. after what she called a retreat from global leadership under President Barack Obama’s administration.
The United Nations is “often at odds with American national interests and American taxpayers,” Haley said, adding that she would use the “leverage” of potential cuts in U.S. funding to demand change.
She expressed skepticism about working with Russia.
“Russia is trying to show their muscle right now. It’s what they do,” Haley said. “I don’t think that we can trust them,” she added. “We have to continue to be very strong
back and show them what this new administration is going to be.”
She said she agrees that Russia invaded and seized Ukrainian territory in 2014 and that U.S. and international sanctions were an appropriate response.
She said she would consider additional sanctions, something Trump has suggested he may oppose.
Haley said she has not had a detailed conversation with Trump about the U.S. relationship with Russia.
Russia, like the United States, holds a permanent seat on the U.N. Security Council.
Haley criticized the Obama administration for allowing the U.N. Security Council to condemn Israel and pledged never to let it happen again if confirmed as the next U.N. ambassador.
“I will not go to New York and abstain when the U.N. seeks to create an international environment that encourages boycotts of Israel,” Haley said.
“I will never abstain when the United Nations takes any action that comes in direct conflict with the interests and values of the United States.”
Haley, if confirmed, would succeed U.N. Ambassador Samantha Power, whose farewell address Tuesday was a prosecution of Putin’s Russia for what she called a systematic subversion of international rules, including an effort to “undercut the credibility of international institutions like the U.N.”
Power blamed the Russian leader for the deaths of opposition figures and journalists in Russia and called the Russian invasion and annexation of Crimea a “land grab.”
Before the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee on Wednesday, Price, the health and human services secretary nominee, said Trump is “absolutely not” planning to overhaul Medicare as he tries to revamp coverage under the health care law. He acknowledged that high prescription drug costs are a problem, but did not endorse the idea of government directly negotiating prices.
Throughout the nearly four-hour hearing, Democrats peppered Price with questions about his stock trades. The sometimes confusing exchanges involved different transactions under distinct circumstances. Price, who has signed a government
ethics agreement to sell his stock, was clearly annoyed by the suggestion that he profited from his official position. “I’m offended by that insinuation,” he told Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass.
Committee Chairman Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., lauded Price’s performance, but ranking Democrat Patty Murray of Washington said she remains deeply concerned.
Price, an orthopedic surgeon-turned-legislator, said he wants to reopen a bipartisan dialogue on health care centered on practical solutions.
“One of my goals in this entire debate is to lower the temperature,” said Price, speaking in even, measured tones. “People need to know that no rug is going to be pulled out from under them.”
Alexander said he took that to mean that the Trump administration will be careful and not attempt to repeal the 2010 health care law without a replacement ready to go. The Affordable Care Act provides coverage to about 20 million people, and government as well as private experts say repealing without a concrete substitute would make millions uninsured and spike premiums.
But Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., said, “I don’t think ‘ lowering the temperature’ is consistent with rushing” to repeal and replace. Trump has promised to unveil his plan when Price is confirmed.
With coverage for millions at stake, Price faced pointed questions about Trump’s evolving stance on health care. Trump campaigned on repealing the 2010 law. But he has made recent comments about providing insurance for everyone and taking on the drug companies.
In an interview aired Wednesday on Fox News Channel, Trump said his approach would offer coverage through private insurers for people who cannot afford it.
“Nobody is going to be dying on the streets with a President Trump,” he said. He said his plan would “probably” turn Medicaid over to the states in the form of block grants to cover low-income people. Democrats reminded Price that approach could lock in big cuts.
Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., pressed Price on whether Trump intends to keep promises repeatedly made during the presidential campaign not to cut Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.
“I have no reason to believe
he’s changed his position,” Price said.
Senators also heard from Trump’s picks to head the Commerce Department and the Environmental Protection Agency.
Billionaire investor Wilbur Ross singled out changes to NAFTA, the nation’s free-trade agreement with Mexico and Canada, as “the first thing” he would address if confirmed as secretary of commerce.
Speaking before the Senate Commerce Committee, Ross argued that the United States should open its economic borders to countries that “play by the rules.” But those that do not, he said, “should be punished — severely.”
“I am not anti-trade. I am pro trade,” Ross said. “But I am pro-sensible trade, not pro-trade that is to the disadvantage of the American worker and the American manufacturing community.”
Trump made renegotiating the nation’s trade agreements a centerpiece of his presidential campaign.
Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt, meanwhile, told the Senate Energy and Public Works Committee that he disagreed with Trump’s earlier claims that global warming is a hoax created by the Chinese to harm the economic competitiveness of the United States.
“I do not believe climate change is a hoax,” Pruitt said.
The Republican has previously cast doubt on the extensive body of scientific evidence showing that the planet is warming and manmade carbon emissions are to blame. In a 2016 opinion article, Pruitt suggested that the debate over global warming “is far from settled” and he claimed that “scientists continue to disagree about the degree and extent of global warming and its connection to the actions of mankind.”
At the hearing, Pruitt conceded that human activity contributes “in some manner” to climate change. He continued, however, to question whether the burning of fossil fuels is the primary reason and refused to say whether sea levels are rising.
Pressed by Sanders to answer in detail about his beliefs about climate change, Pruitt responded that his personal opinion was “immaterial” to how he would enforce environmental laws.
Late Wednesday, a Trump transition official speaking on condition of anonymity disclosed that Trump has chosen former Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue to serve as agriculture secretary.
The person who revealed Trump’s pick was not authorized to speak publicly before it is announced. Perdue is a 70-year-old agribusiness owner and veterinarian.
Separately, six attorneys general from across the U.S. sent a letter urging the Senate Judiciary Committee to
reject the nomination of Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., for U.S. attorney general.
In the letter, dated Tuesday, the prosecutors said they had “grave concern” that Session would “diligently and fairly enforce all laws protective of civil rights, public safety, health and welfare.”
The letter said Sessions made bigoted statements in the past; rejected sensible, criminal justice policy changes; and badly managed his office during his tenure as Alabama attorney general.
Attorneys General Eric Schneiderman of New York, Ellen Rosenblum of Oregon, Brian Frosh of Maryland, Maura Healey of Massachusetts, Doug Chin of Hawaii and Karl Racine of the District of Columbia signed the letter. Information for this article was contributed by Richard Lardner, Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar, Alan Fram, Michael Biesecker, Matthew Daly, Sean Murphy and staff members of The Associated Press and by Anne Gearan, Sean Sullivan and Ylan Q. Mui of The Washington Post.