In July, President Biden announced that he planned to nominate Deborah E. Lipstadt, a renowned Holocaust scholar, to head a new office at the State Department assigned to the fight against rising anti-Semitism over the Holocaust. whole world.
The decision was praised by more than 20 liberal and conservative Jewish groups, all of whom were impressed by Dr. Lipstadt and her reputation for standing up to anti-Semitism wherever she saw it, be it neo-Nazi marches in Charlottesville, Virginia. , or a liberal icon in Congress.
But nearly six months later, Dr. Lipstadt in limbo, thwarted by Senate Republicans who have complained that she criticized some of them on Twitter.
dr. Lipstadt is one of the most prominent of the hundreds of Biden nominees whose bids for Senate-confirmed jobs have languished due to partisan dysfunction or personal irritation. In a rare but barely shining example of courtesy, members of both parties agree that the confirmation system is a controversial mess, due in part to what Senator Mitch McConnell, Republican of Kentucky and minority leader, has called “grass problems.” .
The problem seems to be the worst it has ever been. A year after Mr Biden’s inauguration, only 41 percent of his nominees for Senate-confirmed positions have been approved, according to a new analysis by the Partnership for Public Service, an impartial group that aims to make the federal government more effective.
Mr. Biden, for his part, has issued nominations faster than President Donald J. Trump, but slower than Presidents Barack Obama and George W. Bush, according to the analysis. Regardless, it has taken the Senate an average of 103 days to confirm Biden’s nominees — about a month longer than in the Obama administration, about twice as long as in the Clinton administration, and nearly three times as long as in the Obama administration. during the Reagan era.
“You see a broken system collapsing even further, and in an election year it won’t get any better,” said Max Stier, the Partnership’s chief executive. “We need a political Geneva Convention to distinguish between legitimate partisan differences and the destruction of our core government infrastructure.”
Late last month, New York Democrat and majority leader Senator Chuck Schumer agreed to schedule a potentially contentious vote to impose sanctions on the company behind a Russian-built natural gas pipeline to Germany to satisfy Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz. who had blocked dozens of State Department nominees over the matter. Shortly thereafter, the Senate approved nearly 40 nominations, including Mr. Biden’s choice to become US ambassadors to China and Japan. But dozens of others get stuck.
“The truth is that the unprecedented obstructionism of some Republicans is straining the system to its limits,” New Jersey Democrat Bob Menendez, a New Jersey Democrat and chair of the Committee on Foreign Relations, said on the Senate floor last month, adding that the situation is affecting the president. force it to operate without critical national security officials present, “weakening our nation”.
Charts provided by a staffer for the committee’s highest-ranking Republican, Senator Jim Risch of Idaho, suggested the committee was moving forward with nominations faster than in the previous Congress, when Mr. Risch was the committee chair.
But more than 15 other Senate committees have jurisdiction over some nominations. And dragging feet goes beyond blocking committee hearings on nominees.
Last month, Arkansas Republican Senator Tom Cotton briefly declined to confirm five US attorney nominees from Democratic-oriented states. demanding on the Senate floor that Senator Richard J. Durbin, Democrat of Illinois, first apologizes for interrupting him more than eight months earlier in a hearing. The Senate voted to confirm all five nominees shortly after Mr Durbin apologized.
This month, the White House submitted more than 100 nominations after the Senate adjourned for the December recess without taking action. Some of those nominees have waited nearly a year to take up the job, including Dilawar Syed, who was originally nominated in March as deputy administrator for the Small Business Administration. Republicans’ objections to the confirmation of Mr. Syed, who would be the highest-ranking Muslim in the federal government, include his work for a Muslim advocacy group. But they have also cited opposition to the Small Business Administration’s decision to approve pandemic aid to abortion providers.
Mr Biden has also nominated Ed Gonzalez, the sheriff of Harris County, Texas, to lead immigration and customs enforcement, after originally nominating him in April. Despite its critical role in controlling the flow of immigrants across the southern border, ICE has not had a permanent leader since 2017.
In this maelstrom went the nomination of Dr. Lipstadt.
The White House announced in late July that Dr. Lipstadt would lead an expanded office at the State Department aimed at detecting and countering the rise of anti-Semitism abroad. For the first time, the role would carry the rank of ambassador, requiring Senate confirmation.
Mr. Risch declined to say last month when Republicans would agree to a hearing on Dr. Lipstadt. Mr. Risch and other Republicans have alluded to the heist related to a tweet from Dr. Lipstadt on Senator Ron Johnson, Republican from Wisconsin, who also serves on the Foreign Relations Committee.
In March, Mr. Johnson dismissed the Jan. 6 Capitol riots, saying in a radio interview that he might have felt more threatened had the rioters been “Black Lives Matter and antifa protesters” rather than Trump supporters who “Love this country, really respect law enforcement.”
Within days, Dr. Lipstadt tweeted linked to an article on Mr Johnson’s comments and added: “This is white supremacy/nationalism. Pure and simple.”
Republicans are said to be thinking about getting Dr. Lipstadt to apologize publicly to Johnson before letting her nomination go through.
dr. Lipstadt, 74, is the Dorot professor of modern Jewish history and Holocaust studies at Emory University, and founding director of Emory’s Institute for Jewish Studies. The chairmen of both parties have recognized her scholarship and nominated her for leadership positions at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.
dr. Lipstadt has written six books on anti-Semitism, the Holocaust and Holocaust denial. In 1993, English author David Irving sued her and her publisher, Penguin Books, for defamation in Britain after describing him in one of her books as one of the world’s most dangerous Holocaust deniers.
In 2000, Mr. Irving lost the case, in a verdict that was a sweeping conviction of his and Holocaust denial. dr. Lipstadt documented the 10-week trial in her book “History on Trial,” which became the basis of a 2016 film, “Denial.”
dr. Lipstadt has a long history of using Twitter and other public forums to criticize politicians right and left. In 2019, she sharply criticized Minnesota Democrat Ilhan Omar for characterizing pro-Israel Americans as a “political influence in this country who says it’s okay for people to push for loyalty to a foreign country.” Such statements are “part of the textbook charges against Jews,” Dr. Lipstadt to a reporter for Jewish Insider.
Later that same year, after Trump rejected white supremacy in a statement following shootings in El Paso and Dayton, Ohio, Dr. Lipstadt told Jewish Insider that his words were insufficient. “While it was good to finally hear him utter those words – white supremacy – obscuring the fact that white supremacy is one of the main, if not the main motivating factor of these domestic terrorists, by lumping this issue together with spiritual health and gun control,” she said. said.