Flake: I’ll Block Judges Until Mueller Protection Vote

NPR reports:

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., is blocking a bipartisan effort to protect special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation of the Russia attack on the 2016 presidential election — prompting retiring Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., to pledge he will block progress on confirming judicial nominees.

“Why are we so sanguine about this?” Flake said in a speech on the Senate floor Wednesday. “Why? Why do we do this, to protect a man who seemingly is so incurious about what Russia did during the 2016 elections. Why do we do that?”

Flake holds the deciding vote on a narrowly divided Senate Judiciary Committee, which means he could block forward movement on Republican-nominated judicial picks at the committee level for the rest of the year. There are currently 21 judicial nominees awaiting a vote by the Senate Judiciary Committee.

I have informed the Majority Leader that I will not vote to advance any of the 21 judicial nominees pending in the Judiciary Committee, or vote to confirm the 32 judges awaiting action on the floor, until the Mueller protection bill is brought to the full Senate for a vote.

— Jeff Flake (@JeffFlake) November 15, 2018