The Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works voted this
morning to recommend confirmation of Scott Pruitt to be EPA
Administrator. The vote had been scheduled to take place
yesterday, but Committee Democrats boycotted the meeting,
preventing a quorum for a vote. The Democrats boycotted the
meeting again today, but the Republicans then voted to suspend the
Committee's quorum rules requiring at least two members of the
minority party present for a vote. The suspension cleared the
way for the Committee to approve Pruitt without any Democrats
present.
The back-and-forth mirrored events in the Senate Finance
Committee, where Democrats boycotted votes on Steven Mnuchin to be
Treasury Secretary and for Tom Price to be the Secretary for Health
and Human Services. The Treasury Committee then suspended its
rules and voted to recommend both nominees without any Democrats
present.
