Kamala Harris prepared to break tie votes on Biden's judicial nominees
Fresh from a devastating loss to Donald Trump, Vice President Kamala Harris may now head to Capitol Hill to defy him in what could be her last major act in office.
Fresh from a devastating loss to Donald Trump, Vice President Kamala Harris may now head to Capitol Hill to defy him in what could be her last major act in office.
As President Joe Biden attempts to advance a crush of judicial confirmations before he leaves the White House, Democrats are bracing for the possibility of close calls in the process as they ambitiously seek to top the 234 judges Trump secured during his first term.
That’s where Harris would come in. As the president of the Senate, Harris wields the constitutional power to provide a tie-breaking vote. Democrats’ slim majority has made Harris a go-to on this procedure throughout Biden’s tenure, having broken a record last year for casting the most decisive votes of any vice president in history.
It is an issue so important to the president — and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y. — that it came up last week when Harris and Biden met for lunch in their first post-election meeting, three sources with knowledge of the meeting said.
“This is something they want to clear the decks on,” a senior aide to Harris said.
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