GOP triggers 'nuclear option' to speed up Trump picks

Senate Republicans deployed the “nuclear option” on Wednesday to drastically reduce the amount of time it takes to confirm hundreds of President Trump’s nominees.

Senators voted 51-48 to change the rules for the amount of time it takes to confirm most executive nominations with only a simple majority of the chamber. GOP Sens. Mike Lee (Utah) and Susan Collins (Maine) joined with Democrats in opposing the rules change.

Republicans are expected to trigger the “nuclear option” for a second time later Wednesday to force through the same change for district court nominations.

The combined actions will result in most nominations that require Senate confirmation needing only two hours of debate after they’ve defeated a filibuster that shows they have the votes to ultimately be confirmed. Before Wednesday’s rules change they faced up to an additional 30 hours of debate.

Supreme Court picks, appeals court judges and Cabinet nominees will not be affected by the rules change and will still face the lengthier Senate floor debate.

But the move will let Republicans hit the gas on confirming nominations, a top priority in an era of divided government that has left lawmakers without big-ticket legislative agenda items.

Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) argued shortly before triggering the hardball procedural tactic that the Senate needed to go back to a “more normal and reasonable process” for confirming nominations.

“Our colleagues across the aisle have chosen to endlessly relitigate the 2016 election rather than actually participate in governing,” McConnell added. “This problem goes deeper than today. We’re talking about the future of this very institution and the future functioning of our constitutional government.

Republicans have set a record for the number of appeals judges confirmed during an administration’s first two years, but they’ve accused Democrats of using the chamber’s legislative rulebook to slow down lower-level executive and judicial nominations.

Of 715 “key positions” tracked by The Washington Post and the Partnership for Public Service, 435 have been confirmed by the Senate. An additional 131 are awaiting confirmation, 12 need to be formally nominated and 140 positions still need nominations.

https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/437189-gop-triggers-nuclear-option-to-speed-up-trump-picks

Interesting…

Top Senate Dems ask FBI to review security risks at Trump properties

Top Senate Democrats are asking the FBI to assess security risks at President Trump’s properties after a woman was found to have entered his Mar-a-Lago club with false documents and malicious software.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), Judiciary Committee ranking member Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and Intelligence Committee ranking member Mark Warner (D-Va.), penned a letter to FBI Director Christopher Wray on Wednesday asking him to probe possible threats. The letter came in response to charges brought Tuesday against Yujin Zhang, who illegally entered the Florida club, while Trump was present, with two Chinese passports, four cellphones and a device containing malware.

“The apparent ease with which Ms. Zhang gained access to the facility during the President’s weekend visit raises concerns about the system for screening visitors, including the reliance on determinations made by Mar-a-Lago employees. As the White House Communications Agency and Secret Service coordinate to establish several secure areas at Mar-a-Lago for handling classified information when the President travels there, these potential vulnerabilities have serious national security implications,” the senators wrote.

“Accordingly, we ask that the FBI, in consultation with the Director of National Intelligence, assess the risks at Mar-a-Lago posed by establishment of areas for classified information at facility accessible to the public and foreign nationals.”

The senators also requested the FBI work with the Secret Service to take steps to prevent foreign government agents from gaining access to the properties or conducting electronic surveillance.

https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/437227-top-senate-dems-ask-fbi-to-review-security-risks-at-trump-properties

<<<The senators also requested the FBI work with the Secret Service to take steps to prevent foreign government agents from gaining access to the properties or conducting electronic surveillance.>>>

OH, so now it's important to prevent foreign governments from gaining access to electronic data on POTUS…. This include FVEY's???

Cummings: Accounting firm wants subpoena before providing Trump financial documents

House Oversight and Reform Committee Chair Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.) said Wednesday that a tax and accounting firm asked for a procedural subpoena before giving 10 years of President Trump’s financial records, according to Politico.

Mazars USA intends to produce the records but asked the committee for a so-called “friendly” subpoena before formally complying, Cummings said, according to the publication.

“They have told us that they will provide the information pretty much when they have a subpoena,” Cummings said. “And we’ll get them a subpoena.”

Cummings initially asked the firm for the records in late March, seeking documents going back to Jan. 1, 2009. He cited testimony from Michael Cohen, Trump’s former personal attorney, who testified that Trump had frequently misstated his net worth as both higher and lower than it actually was for “potentially improper purposes.”

Since Cohen’s testimony, the committee has sought to corroborate it through document requests and witness interviews, with Cummings mentioning Trump’s attempt to purchase the Buffalo Bills before becoming president.

Two Oversight Republicans, Reps. Mark Meadows (N.C.) and Jim Jordan (Ohio) have pushed back on Cummings’ requests, saying the chairman sought the information “solely to embarrass President Trump and to advance the relentless Democrat attacks upon the Trump administration.”

On Tuesday, the committee also announced it has served four subpoenas in relation to its probe into White House security clearances and the Trump administration’s push to add a citizenship question to the 2020 census.

https://thehill.com/homenews/house/437235-cummings-accounting-firm-wants-subpoena-before-providing-trump-financial

Trump To Give China Until 2025 To Commit To Trade Deal

With 4 minutes to go before the close of trading and stocks within spitting territory of red for the day, someone had to take control of "price discovery" and with the FT's street cred already used up after it's "90% done" report last night, it was up to Bloomberg to preserve the "trade talk optimism" which it did when it reported fresh details on the ongoing trade deal being finalized (and we use the term loosely) between the US China, which according to Bloomberg source would give Beijing until 2025 to meet commitments on commodity purchases and allow American companies to wholly own enterprises in the Asian nation.

And here is where the "deal" gets downright farcical: according to the proposed agreement (and we again use the term loosely), China would commit by 2025 to buy more U.S. commodities, including soybeans and energy products, and allow 100 percent foreign ownership for U.S. companies operating in China as a binding pledge that can trigger retaliation from the U.S. if left unfulfilled.

In other words, any deal would be anything but for the next 6 years. More importantly, as we noted earlier, the 5 years interval would allow stocks to levitate each and every day for the next 5 years on "trade talk optimism", putting S&P 36,000 within easy grasp.

The goal over the next few days, Bloomberg reports, "is to strike an agreement on the core issues so President Donald Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping can hold a ceremony to sign a deal." To achieve that, Lighthizer, Mnuchin and Liu held a working dinner Tuesday night, according to one of the people.

In other words, some sort of announcement is practically assured; the only problem is that - thanks to the stated 2025 deal implementation target - this would fall of Trump's second term (assuming he wins re-election), in other words both sides implicitly admit that any deal is a sham for all practical purposes, and all that would happen is to give markets a brief, last minute push higher, as the entire US-China trade war episode is put in the rear view mirror.

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2019-04-03/trump-give-china-trade-deal-commitment-deadline-2025

I believe this should be read with the possible lens that China is wanting to wait out POTUS's 2nd term.