Mcconnell: No more blue slips on judges

WASHINGTON — The Senate’s top Republican, facing pressure from conservative groups, is promising to upend a longstanding Senate tradition in order to speed the confirmation pace on a backlog of President Donald Trump’s judicial nominees.

Conservative activists such as the Judicial Crisis Network have been increasingly frustrated with the slow pace on judicial nominees. The group had threatened to run ads against Majority Leader Mitch McConnell but backed off after winning assurances from the Kentucky Republican that the pace will quicken.

Mcconnell has also announced in media interviews that the Senate will no longer abide by a longstanding tradition that home-state senators must sign off on a judge before a Senate vote.

Democrats have been slow-walking many of Trump’s nominees but say Mcconnell is going too far by upending decades of precedent in which senators return a so-called blue slip to sign off on a home state judicial nominee.

“The Senate has fewer and fewer mechanisms that create bipartisanship and bring people to an agreement. The blue slips are one of them,” said Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y. “It’s just a shame that Senator Mcconnell is willing to abandon it.”

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Charles Grassley, R-iowa, has so far been respecting the blue slip tradition. But Democratic opposition to a number of Trump nominees is sure to test his resolve and could spark conflict with Mcconnell.

“Now that a Republican is in the White House, Senator Mcconnell is trying to turn the Judiciary Committee into a rubber stamp for President Trump,” said former Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-VT. “But it is not up to Senator McConnell; it is up to the committee’s chairman.”