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WASHINGTON (CN) — President Donald Trump on Tuesday demanded that Republicans abandon the Senate blue slip tradition, calling the decades-old practice a “hoax” and framing it as an unnecessary impediment to his executive authority to appoint judicial nominees.
If the Senate followed through on the president’s call to eliminate blue slips, the move would effectively cut Democratic lawmakers out of the judicial selection process under the Trump administration — even when the White House nominates federal judges and U.S. attorneys in their home states.
A practice employed by the Senate since at least 1917, blue slips allow senators to offer their approval or stake out their opposition to judicial nominees that would have jurisdiction over their constituents. Though the tradition has had a checkered history in recent years, both Democrats and Republicans have honored blue slips for federal district court and U.S. attorney nominees.
But Trump, apparently furious about the use of blue slips to hamper some of his own nominees, called on Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley, chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, to stop abiding by the practice altogether.
The president, referring to blue slips as a “hoax” and a “scam,” argued that Democratic senators have used the practice to place an “ironclad stoppage” on his candidates for federal judgeships and U.S. attorneys.
“Put simply, the president of the United States will never be permitted to appoint the person of his choice because of an ancient, and probably unconstitutional, ‘CUSTOM,’ that if you have, even one person in the opposite party serving in the U.S. Senate, he/she must give consent, thereby completely stopping the opposite party’s nomination,” Trump wrote in a post on his social media platform Truth Social.
The president did not provide evidence to support his claim that blue slips were “probably unconstitutional.” The Constitution gives the Senate the power of “advice and consent” over presidential appointments. And blue slips can only be returned by home state senators, contrary to Trump’s suggestion that “even one person” in the opposite party could single-handedly block a White House nominee.
Trump called on Grassley to “step up” and do away with the blue slip tradition, adding that former President Joe Biden “openly broke” the tradition at least twice. It wasn’t immediately clear what the president was referring to.
“He should do this, IMMEDIATELY, and not let the Democrats laugh at him and the Republican Party for being weak and ineffective,” Trump said of the Judiciary Committee chairman. “The Democrats have broken this ridiculous custom on us, it’s time that we break it on them.”
A Grassley spokesperson told Courthouse News in a statement that the committee chairman had already successfully moved U.S. attorneys through his panel with blue slip support from Democrats. Trump’s nominees for federal prosecutor slots in Virginia and Minnesota, blue states, both secured the backing of their Democratic home state lawmakers.
“When a nominee comes out of committee all 100 senators have a say on the nomination and part of their consideration is based on the home state senators’ input,” the spokesperson added
Grassley has previously expressed support for the blue slip custom and signaled that he would continue to honor it for federal district court and U.S. attorney nominees.
Still, the Iowa Republican was in charge of the Judiciary Committee the last time lawmakers altered the tradition. During his time as chair of the panel in 2017, Grassley said he would no longer honor blue slips for appellate nominees. He reasoned at the time that the practice could serve as a de facto veto from one lawmaker for circuit court judges, whose jurisdiction covers several states.
When Democrats retook the Senate majority under the Biden administration, Illinois Senator Dick Durbin, then the Judiciary Committee chairman, said he would keep that precedent alive. Durbin contended that there should not be one set of rules for Republicans and another for Democrats.
Nonetheless, GOP lawmakers repeatedly bristled at what they claimed was a lack of consultation from the Biden White House on appellate nominees.
A spokesperson for Durbin’s office did not immediately return a request for comment on Trump’s tirade against the blue slip tradition.
Blue slips were employed by Senate Democrats as recently as this month to oppose Trump administration nominees. New Jersey Senators Cory Booker and Andy Kim refused to return blue slips for Alina Habba, the president’s pick to become U.S. attorney for the District of New Jersey. That move effectively scuttled Habba’s chances of Senate confirmation — and forced the administration to take a controversial legal route to keep her on as the Garden State’s top prosecutor.
Trump, meanwhile, isn’t alone in his calls to do away with the blue slip tradition. Some legal advocates — including some progressives — have called on the Senate to end the practice, framing it as a tool of obstruction that allows a single home state senator to hold up a nominee for partisan reasons.
Others have accused the Senate of clinging to an outmoded practice in the name of a bipartisan spirit that no longer exists.
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