Remaining Trump Nominees Prepare for Bruising Confirmation Fights, With Gabbard, Kennedy, and Patel Sitting for Hearings

President Trump’s team is preparing for what will surely be a bruising week for three of the president’s most controversial nominees — Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., and Kash Patel — all of whom will sit for their confirmation hearings in the coming days. All three face serious and unique challenges to winning their posts. Many of Mr. Trump’s cabinet and cabinet-level nominees are expected to breeze through the confirmation process with a Republican-controlled Senate where 53 seats are currently held by the GOP. The president’s nominee to lead the Pentagon, Secretary Hegseth, narrowly made his way through the confirmation process this week, with Vice President Vance breaking the tie. With Mr. Hegseth confirmed, Washington’s attention will now turn to this week’s slate of nominees. Ms. Gabbard is considered by many to be the most imperiled of Mr. Trump’s choices. She has been chosen to serve as Director of National Intelligence — a position that would allow Ms. Gabbard to oversee America’s intelligence apparatus and serve as principal national security advisor for the president. Some senators are deeply concerned about her 2017 meetings with Syria’s then-leader, President Assad, and her support for whistleblower Edward Snowden, who has been living in Russia since 2013. Multiple senators who have been ardently pro-Ukraine since the war began in 2022 also have so far refused to support Ms. Gabbard. Senator McConnell, who bucked his party to vote against Mr. Hegseth this week, has been silent on Ms. Gabbard’s nomination since it was made in November. Shortly after the Russian invasion occurred, Ms. Gabbard called on President Biden and the Ukrainians to assure Russia that Ukraine would never join NATO as a way to end the war. The top Democrat on the Intelligence Committee, Senator Warner, said he still has serious “questions” for Ms. Gabbard, even after meeting with her. “I had questions going in. I have questions coming out,” Mr. Warner told reporters in early January, according to the Hill. “This is an extraordinarily important job,” he added. “A lot of this [is] also about protecting the independence of the intelligence community and making sure we continue to have the ability to share classified information with our allies.”Before Ms. Gabbard’s confirmation hearing on Thursday, Mr. Kennedy — the nominee for secretary of health and human services — will sit before the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions panel, where he is expected to be questioned about his skepticism about vaccines and his pro-abortion rights record, which has alarmed some conservatives. Advancing American Freedom, an outside spending group led by Vice President Pence, is already running ads against Mr. Kennedy because of his liberal record on abortion. “His record raises serious concerns for pro-life Americans. We need leadership that defends life and protects the most vulnerable — not radical policies that undermine our values,” the group wrote on X. Senator Hawley similarly had concerns about Mr. Kennedy’s abortion position when he was first nominated, but said in December that he won some assurances from the health and human services nominee. In a lengthy thread of posts on X, Mr. Hawley said that Mr. Kennedy promised to bar the use of taxpayer dollars for abortions and pledged to uphold protections for those healthcare providers who have “conscience objections” to providing abortion services. Mr. Kennedy’s assistant secretaries at the department will also be anti-abortion rights, Mr. Hawley said. Mr. Patel, like Ms. Gabbard, will also have his confirmation hearing on Thursday. He will appear before the Judiciary Committee where he will be grilled on his past comments about election fraud and a so-called “enemies list” he published in his book “Government Gangsters.” The list included people like the former defense secretary, Lloyd Austin; the former attorney general, Bill Barr; and former FBI director, James Comey. He himself does not style it as an enemies list, but rather just a list of the “executive branch deep state.”Mr. Patel has a powerful advocate in Senator Tillis, the North Carolina Republican who is up for re-election next year who came close to voting against Mr. Hegseth this week. Mr. Tillis has been acting as Mr. Patel’s “Senate shepherd,” taking him to other senators’ offices to advocate for him. Correction: Secretary of defense is the title of Lloyd Austin’s former position. His title was misstated in an earlier version.

Remaining Trump Nominees Prepare for Bruising Confirmation Fights, With Gabbard, Kennedy, and Patel Sitting for Hearings

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