The Scoop
President Donald Trump is getting frustrated with a growing backlog of unconfirmed diplomatic nominees piling up on the Senate floor. It’s enough to threaten one of the few sacred things left in Congress.
“I know that the administration would like us to perhaps cancel some of the August recess in order to get these through,” Majority Whip John Barrasso, R-Wyo., told Semafor. “And if the Democrats want to continue their behavior, their resistance, we may see that.”
The Foreign Relations Committee advanced five more ambassadorial nominations on Wednesday, bringing the total number of prospective diplomats awaiting floor votes to 21. Add in another group of nominees still waiting in committee — and a blanket hold on State Department nominees from Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii — and it’s easy to see the situation coming to a head.
There’s particular frustration in the administration over the delay in confirming Trump’s Vatican ambassador pick Brian Burch, said one person close to the president. Burch is the co-founder of the conservative group CatholicVote, which endorsed Trump in 2024.
“First American pope in history, and our Senate could not confirm an ambassador in time,” the person told Semafor. “I know our ambassadorships are being approved at the proper pace when that sh*t is fixed.”
It’s now possible that Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., decides to give Democrats a choice between cutting a bipartisan deal on confirming some nominees quickly or staying in session into August while Republicans grind through confirmations to fill in Trump’s diplomatic corps, according to a person familiar with the matter.
Democrats are indicating there may be no deal to be had, given the political background of Trump’s nominees and their party’s broader opposition to Trump’s agenda. Schatz said he has yet to be approached about an agreement; his hold is in protest of the Trump administration’s unilateral shuttering of USAID.
“Nobody has talked to me,” Schatz told Semafor. “The normal thing to do when someone has a hold is to try to figure out what it would take to release the hold. And nobody has checked.”
Senate Foreign Relations Chair Jim Risch, R-Idaho, and ranking member Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., have proven an effective duo atop the committee. Shaheen on Wednesday voted for Kimberly Guilfoyle, Donald Trump Jr.’s ex-fiancee, in her bid to be ambassador to Greece.
But that collaborative spirit can only go so far. And some of Trump’s nominees, chosen months ago, still haven’t cleared the hurdles necessary for floor votes. Shaheen said “the White House is not getting the documents that we need to move nominees.”
“The president is eager to implement his America First foreign policy agenda, and expects the Senate to quickly confirm remaining ambassador picks to execute the agenda the American people voted for,” said Taylor Rogers, a spokeswoman for the White House.
On the Senate floor, Democrats are delaying almost all of Trump’s nominees, requiring GOP leaders to burn floor time on them and limiting the number of confirmations.
“Every president deserves the right to select his team. My committee has worked to move nominations as efficiently as possible to get those roles filled, and unfortunately many Democrats are choosing to let their political issues with the president get in the way of staffing our embassies abroad,” Risch told Semafor.
Shaheen vowed to prioritize quick confirmation of career diplomats to become ambassadors — but Democrats say those are in short supply among Trump’s picks.
“Sticking to the general norm of about two-thirds career and one-third political is smart,” said Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., a member of the Foreign Relations Committee. Trump’s focus on nominees with more political than diplomatic experience, he said, “is not a good idea.”
Know More
Trump is favoring politically-minded nominees rather than leaning on current State Department employees to fill top embassy posts.
The president is resisting the normal practice in part due to his clash with the then-US ambassador to Ukraine, Marie Yovanovitch, during his first administration, the person close to the president said. The Trump-Yovanovitch tension played a central role in the president’s first impeachment trial.
The person said that there simply aren’t enough Trump-aligned career officials to select from, adding that the administration will “have to give in and nominate those” who tack more towards the center “soon.”
In the meantime, Trump has selected some prominent personalities to become ambassadors who are now waiting for their turns on the Senate floor.
Among them is self-proclaimed “alpha-male” Nick Adams, a conservative influencer known for his commentary on masculinity, now Trump’s pick to be US ambassador to Malaysia. Conservative media critic Leo Brent Bozell III, founder of the Media Research Center and a pro-Israel commentator, is tapped to be US ambassador to South Africa.
Trump plucked former NFL player and Senate candidate Herschel Walker to be his ambassador to the Bahamas. Andrew Puzder, who failed to win Senate confirmation as Trump’s labor secretary nominee in 2017, is nominated to be ambassador to the European Union.
Trump’s close friend, Tom Barrack, was already confirmed to be ambassador to Turkey, as was Charles Kushner, the father of Trump’s son-in-law. He is now ambassador to France.
Democrats might be open to confirming more career ambassadors, but that won’t solve the growing backlog. Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., a member of Foreign Relations, said “I don’t think I’ve seen a single career nominee on the committee.”
“I am one who’s long believed and known that it hurts us as a country when we have vacancies,” Coons added. “That’s why I thought the abrupt firing of 1,300 career State Department employees was a bad idea.”
Barrasso, also a Foreign Relations member, estimated the Senate can confirm about three ambassadors a day. If the Senate cancelled a week of recess, it could make a dent in the workload — but not erase it entirely.
“If the Democrats were honest about this, they would put together and agree to a bipartisan package of nominees … before the August recess, to get lots of people in positions,” Barrasso said. “They have been unwilling to do any of those things.”
Burgess, Morgan, and Shelby’s View
The situation Trump faces is hardly unique to his White House.
Blocking diplomatic nominees is now a common tactic. One of former President Barack Obama’s nominees died while still waiting for her confirmation to be ambassador to the Bahamas. Former President Joe Biden faced blanket blockades across his administration.
Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, a former whip, noted that for Trump things are “actually faster than it was during the first term.”
It’s true: Trump has a dozen confirmed ambassadors, compared with just seven at this point during his first term, according to Kathryn Dunn Tenpas, a visiting fellow at the Brookings Institution.
“Act like you’re surprised. I mean, that has been the case for years now,” Minority Whip Dick Durbin, D-Ill., told Semafor. “We ought to find a way, if they are not controversial, for them to get through. When they’re political it’s a fair question.”
The Senate has also been busy with other business. “This is just not unique to Trump,” said Tenpas. “It’s not like they’re not doing anything.”
Room for Disagreement
Some aren’t that troubled by the wait.
“We’re lucky to be so early on the list,” said one European official whose country is awaiting Senate action on its US ambassador. “It always tends to take some time.”
Notable
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Trump’s former national security adviser, Mike Waltz, faced a grilling earlier this week about his use of Signal during his confirmation hearing to become the US ambassador to the United Nations.
