Biden Criticizes Sen. Tuberville for Military Nominations Delay—GOP Senator Hits Back at President For Refusing to Talk

U.S. President Joe Biden addresses a joint press conference with Finland's President after the U.S.-Nordic leaders summit in Helsinki on July 13, 2023. (Alessandro Rampazzo/AFP via Getty Images)

President Joe Biden ridiculed Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) on Thursday for slowing the process to handle military promotions and nominations, but the Alabama senator said the Democratic president has shown no effort to negotiate through their differences.

In December, Mr. Tuberville announced he would stop the Senate from approving large batches of military nominations after the Biden administration adopted a policy to fund travel and leave for military service members who elect to get an abortion but are legally constrained in the states in which they’re stationed. The U.S. Department of Defense adopted this abortion policy last year after numerous U.S. states began constraining abortion following the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization.

Mr. Tuberville’s contention has been that the new DOD abortion policy conflicts with an existing U.S. law that bars the federal government from using taxpayer funds for abortions except in cases of rape, incest, or pregnancies that threaten the life of the mother.

Mr. Tuberville’s block prevents the Senate from approving military nominees in large batches through unanimous consent, instead requiring them to go through slower regular order procedures. The Alabama Republican has vowed to prevent this speedy process of approving military nominations until the DOD either withdraws the abortion policy or Congress changes its laws on whether federal funds can support abortions.

“If Democrats can’t pass legislation to authorize the abortion policy, then it shouldn’t be the policy,” Mr. Tuberville wrote in The Washington Post last month.

On Monday, U.S. Marine Corps Gen. David Berger retired and relinquished his position as Commandant of the Marine Corps. With Mr. Berger’s retirement, the military branch is now without a senate-confirmed chief of staff. Gen. Eric Smith has assumed the commandant role in an acting capacity, amid the slowdown in the Senate’s military nominations process.

The ongoing impasse over military nominations provoked Mr. Biden to lash out at Mr. Tuberville on Thursday, during a press conference in Helsinki, Finland. Mr. Biden said Mr. Tuberville is “jeopardizing U.S. security” with his protest tactics against the DOD abortion policy.

“The idea that we have all these promotions that are in abeyance right now, we don’t know what’s going to happen; the idea that we’re injecting into a fundamental foreign policy decisions what in fact as a domestic social debate on social issues is bizarre,” the president continued. “I don’t ever recall that happening—ever—and it’s just totally irresponsible, in my view.”

President ‘Doesn’t Even Want to Talk’: Tuberville

At the Helsinki press conference on Thursday, a reporter asked Mr. Biden if he would be willing to talk with Mr. Tuberville in order to end the impasse over the DOD abortion policy and the military nominations process. The president replied, “I'd be willing to talk to him if I thought there’s any possibility he was changing this ridiculous position he has.”

In an interview with Breitbart on Thursday, Mr. Tuberville pointed to Mr. Biden’s comments as evidence that the president is not negotiating in good faith.

“He can call me all the names he wants. Does that sound like anybody that wants to get anything done?” Mr. Tuberville said.

Mr. Tuberville had raised opposition to the DOD’s abortion policy since July of last year, before the DOD had even formally submitted the policy decision covering leave and expenses for abortion-related travel and had been trying for months since to convince the DOD to either retract the policy or make the change through an act of Congress.

“We’ve got a White House and a Pentagon that is trying to legislate their own laws, and we’re not gonna allow them to do that,” Mr. Tuberville said. “Now they’re gonna change it with a memo? That’s not gonna happen, and I told him that.”

Mr. Tuberville said he believes the reason the Democrats haven’t tried to change the policy on federal funding for abortion-related expenses is because they know they'd fail if they tried it that way.

Mr. Tuberville also took a shot at the Biden administration’s negotiating skills, arguing the administration could have avoided the ongoing war between Russia and Ukraine or ended it by now through negotiations.

“We got a war going on in Ukraine right now, that if [Mr. Biden] were to get out there and negotiated, or maybe even after the war started, to negotiate with both groups, we can get this thing over. People are getting killed, but it seems like this White House has no negotiating skills whatsoever,” the Alabama Republican said.

Senator, Defense Secretary Briefly Talk

Despite Mr. Biden and Mr. Tuberville’s clash earlier on Thursday, the Alabama senator did speak with Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin later in the day. Pentagon press secretary Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder told reporters that the call had been brief, but that the two discussed the delays on processing military nominees.

A spokesman told The Hill that Mr. Austin explained to Mr. Tuberville the “impact the holds are having to military readiness and uncertainty in the force,” Mr. Ryder said the two agreed to speak again sometime next week.

Mr. Tuberville reportedly expressed gratitude for the cordial exchange and was open to continued discussion on the issue.

Military Nominations Could Still Proceed

Mr. Biden, members of his administration, and Democratic lawmakers have argued that Mr. Tuberville’s decision to block the unanimous consent passage of bulk military nominations jeopardizes national security.

While Mr. Tuberville’s hold on military nominations blocks the Senate from approving them all at once, nominations can still proceed one by one.

“I am not stopping anyone from getting confirmed, and I am not stopping anyone from voting,” he wrote in the Post last month. “Democrats could simply put these nominations up for a vote, but they clearly don’t want to. Instead they wasted hours of Senate floor time trying to harangue me into letting the nominations pass through unanimous consent. This tactic hasn’t worked, and it won’t work. I am more than happy to vote on these nominations, and I would probably vote for many, if not most, of them.”

Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) has backed Mr. Tuberville, arguing that Senate Democrats could still confirm military nominees.

“Tuberville wouldn’t agree to expedite Senate consideration of DOD nominees. (This is a move that doesn’t halt the nominations in question, but makes the process for confirming them slower),” Mr. Lee wrote on Twitter Wednesday. “DOD carried out the plan anyway, and Dems are now furious with Tuberville for doing exactly what he said he’d do if DOD ignored his warning.”

From NTD News