Senate confirmation battle escalates as bipartisan deal on nominees dies

Last-minute closed-door talks between Senate Republicans and Democrats failed to prevent a “nuclear option” in the upper chamber after frustrations on both sides killed a deal to move ahead with President Donald Trump’s nominees.  

Lawmakers were inching closer to a deal that would have allowed sub-Cabinet-level nominees to be voted on in bunches, but neither side could reach a final agreement.

Senate Republicans argued that a majority of their counterparts agreed with the new proposal but that Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., was still standing in the way.

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“I think the majority of Democrats are on board with it,” Sen. James Lankford, R-Okla., told Fox News Digital. “And Schumer is blocking it from actually having consent to come to the floor.”

The failed deal was a modified version of a proposal first unveiled by Senate Democrats in 2023 and would have allowed 15 nominees to be batched together in a bloc and voted on while still requiring two hours of debate for the group.

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Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., is holding firm on his and Senate Democrats’ blockade of President Donald Trump’s nominees as Senate Republicans march toward a nuclear rules change.  (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)

But when Lankford brought the proposal to the floor for consideration, Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, blocked it.

Schatz argued that Senate Republicans were trying to rush through the negotiating process ahead of their plan to leave Washington for the weekend.

“What they’re asking for is unanimity, and we don’t have it,” he said. “And so, if you’re interested in enacting this on a bipartisan basis, the process for doing that — it is available to you. But, again, it’s more a matter of running out of patience than running out of time.”

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President Donald Trump speaks to reporters as he leaves the White House in Washington Sunday, Sept. 7, 2025.  (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana)

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., fired back, “How much time is enough?”

“Give me a break,” he said. “Two years….