Transcript: How Trump Can Steamroll Senate with Gaetz Pick, Explained

Second, seems to me, even if they were in disagreement and the president adjourned Congress, the president can’t keep the Senate adjourned. There is what we call a standing order. It’s in the books on the Senate rules manual, and it says that the majority leader and the minority leader together can call the Senate back into session. If senators were really concerned about the nature of these nominees, so concerned that they wanted to prevent more recess appointments, majority and minority leaders together bring that chamber back in a day later. So the Senate is not powerless here, but Senate majority has to figure out: How are we going to look at this threat to our powers of advice-and-consent, and how do we weigh that against infuriating the brand-new president and his voters, who are also their voters?

Sargent: Right. In the scenario that I’m imagining around Mike Johnson, and the one that Ed Whelan is talking about, Republican senators would tacitly go along with the scheme. So Mike Johnson essentially says, Let’s adjourn. The Senate says no, or putting aside the difficulties of describing disagreements, or so forth (let’s just assume for now that there actually is a disagreement). Trump adjourns them. Then he starts rolling out the appointments, right? The recess appointments: RFK, Bozo the Clown. At that point, Republican senators say, Jesus, we can’t get in the way of this bulldozer. They basically say, We can’t do anything, he sent us home. You see what I mean? There’s like a dance, in which Mike Johnson triggers the whole thing, then Republican senators go along with it.

Binder: It’s certainly a plausible outcome. We’re on the unchartered path here. I don’t want to call it choose your own adventure—choose your own constitutional adventure—but it’s entirely possible that a Senate majority would give into that, avoid having to take controversial votes if they didn’t want to on those nominations through the nomination process, especially knowing that they could be recess appointed anyway. So Trump has put this on their plate. He’s daring them and knowing that even if they stood up to him, he’s going to recess appoint them if he can.