The confirmation of presidential appointees has increasingly become a drag on the Senate, eating up more of the chamber’s schedule and pushing legislation to the back burner. A bipartisan pair of senators say they want to bring transparency to the process.
Sens. Gary Peters, chairman of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, and James Lankford, an Oklahoma Republican who sits on the committee, last week introduced a measure that would create a dashboard to track the status of roughly 1,300 Senate-confirmed positions, giving Congress and the public an up-to-date view.
“The Senate has a constitutional duty to provide advice and consent on presidential appointees, but unfortunately the cumbersome confirmation process and growing number of nominees is cutting into the amount of time Congress can devote to moving legislation that benefits the American people,” Peters, a Michigan Democrat, said in a statement.
