Three more military officers confirmed around Tuberville

The Senate on Thursday confirmed three more senior military officers in its latest move to bypass an expansive blockade on President Biden’s nominees imposed by Senator Tommy Tuberville, a Republican from Alabama, in a bid to gain leverage in a fight over the Pentagon’s travel policy for troops seeking abortions.

Approved by lopsided margins were Admiral Lisa Franchetti, Biden’s choice to lead the Navy, who will become the first woman on the Joint Chiefs of Staff; General David W. Allvin, nominated to lead the Air Force; and Lieutenant General Christopher J. Mahoney, who will be promoted to four-star general, become the Marine Corps’s No. 2 officer and step in as the caretaker commandant in the absence of General Eric Smith, who suffered apparent cardiac arrest on Sunday. Smith, 58, was in stable condition on Wednesday evening with an unclear long-term prognosis.

Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks, the Pentagon’s No. 2 political appointee, appeared to link the hold on Thursday directly to Smith’s condition.

“We’ve said many times in the last six months that the hold is unnecessary, unprecedented, and unsafe, and that it’s bad for our military and bad for our military families, and it’s bad for our country,” she said. “We have seen tragic effects of that stress, but we’ve also seen stress at the individual human level. And I think that’s been well-communicated on Capitol Hill.”

Each of the officers confirmed on Thursday is considered highly qualified.

The confirmation votes came amid mounting frustration among fellow Republicans at Tuberville’s tactics. Over nearly five hours on the Senate floor on Wednesday night, several of his GOP colleagues publicly denounced the gambit and urged Senate leaders to take immediate action to end the impasse. They echoed concerns of the White House and Senate Democrats that Tuberville is undercutting US military readiness at a time when wars are raging in the Middle East and Ukraine.

The Senate can bypass Tuberville’s hold by voting on officers individually, and had done so previously in three instances. Doing so for every frozen nomination, however, would take months.