We have no power over laws and votes on trump appointments, directly, in Senate approval other than the Supreme Court. Republicans have the votes to pass them all.
Our protests, our resistance movement, is great.
But we’ve had a very hard time blocking appointments, not unexpectedly as we are dealing with a very corrupt Republican Party. It’s not as if good reasons to vote no work on them.
So, one, Puzder, was blocked.
It seems to me the only reason he was is that three or more Republican Senators chose to vote no.
The question is, why?
He was terrible, but no worse than other trump nominees from Pruitt to De Voss to Sessions.
Did our resistance movement play a role in those couple of Senators’ votes, who voted yes on every other nominee? Were their state’s voters the reason they did it?
What motivated them? What leverage was found? I think it’s good to try to find the answer, as unfortunately, that’s the only thing that is blocking anything right now.
Part of our need — the biggest part — is organizing resistance among the people and Democratic leaders.
But as we want to try to get a few Republican Senators to do the right thing on specific votes to block policies — such as healthcare repeal or tax policies etc. - learning how to best do that is important.