The Joint Chiefs of Staff has a new chairman, Air Force Gen. C.Q. Brown, after the Senate approved his promotion on Wednesday night, 83-11. Bear that vote in mind the next time anyone suggests that Republicans are standing in the way of military readiness.
That’s certainly the common view in the Beltway echo chamber, which blames Alabama Sen. Tommy Tuberville for a pileup of military promotions. For months he has used “holds” to block confirmation votes in frustration over the Biden White House’s imposition of its culture war on the military. The president and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer have pummeled the GOP, accusing it of damaging military preparedness and acting callously toward military families. That turns reality on its head.
No question the damage is real. More than 300 military officers are in limbo, with the paralysis hitting some services particularly hard. One-third of the U.S. Space Force’s senior officers’ nominations are on hold. The Army, Navy and Marine Corps have been operating under acting uniformed leaders. The Brown promotion averts what would have been an unprecedented vacancy, since the current chairman, Gen. Mark Milley, is due to retire at the end of this month. Many officers’ families are living in suspended animation waiting to relocate to new posts.
Yet Mr. Tuberville didn’t start this battle. The Biden administration fired the first shots in the aftermath of Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health. Eager to capitalize on the abortion issue and to demonstrate an “all of government” response, the White House directed Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin to announce that henceforth defense dollars would pay for service members to take leave and travel to other states for an abortion.
But federal law doesn’t authorize these payments, and the Hyde Amendment prohibits the use of federal funds for most abortions. At worst this is a flagrant violation of statute, another example of the administration evading congressional power and the rule of law. Think of the eviction ban, vaccine mandates and student-loan cancellations. At best it is an asymmetrical intrusion into Congress’s bipartisan annual tradition of hammering out new defense policy.
Mr. Biden had already infused abortion policy into every other department; he was surely warned against extending it to the military but did it anyway. Mr. Tuberville has said for months that as soon as the administration took the simple step of returning to the status quo ante, he would do the same with regard to confirming promotions. No dice.
How determined is the White House to put abortion first? It issued a pre-emptive veto threat against a proposed House defense spending bill because the legislation proposed withholding funding for the Pentagon’s abortion policy.
Then there’s Mr. Schumer, who has spent months insisting he’s helpless against Mr. Tuberville’s holds. As Wednesday’s vote proved, that’s false. Mr. Tuberville has the ability only to slow confirmations by denying unanimous consent. The majority leader can file a cloture motion on any nomination and move it to a floor vote with a simple majority. He prefers to exploit the issue to beat on Republicans and rely on the press to take his side.
Already this month, Mr. Schumer has teed up votes for radical nominees Gwynne Wilcox for the National Labor Relations Board and Anna Gomez for the Federal Communications Commission, along with three Biden nominees for the Federal Reserve. Not a single military nomination rated for Democrats next to these votes. One observer noted that if the Senate had stayed in session in August and managed a few eight-hour days, more than 100 of the military promotions would be completed.
The majority leader finally moved Gen. Brown’s promotion and a few others only because Mr. Tuberville forced his hand. The Alabama senator threatened to use a procedural motion to bring up the Brown vote himself — thereby showing that it could be done, and potentially putting infuriated Democrats in a position of blocking a Biden nominee. Unwilling to lose control, Mr. Schumer finally moved on the promotion — four months late.
Commanders in chief have a special duty not to put the troops in the line of political fire, and most presidents take that vow seriously. Then there’s Joe Biden.
