Tuberville to maintain military holds through August recess, senator says

Alabama Republican Sen. Tommy Tuberville has indicated he has no plans to lift his blanket hold on military promotions before the August recess, contending he has engaged in minimal dialogue with the White House on the matter.

The senator has prevented Senate confirmation of roughly 300 military nominations for months. While he cannot unilaterally block each promotion, he can refuse to grant unanimous consent to approving the promotions in a slate, as it typical. Without unanimous consent, the Senate must schedule individual hearings and votes for each nomination, chewing up valuable floor time.

During an appearance on "The Hill on NewsNation," the Alabama lawmaker indicated he would not change course prior to the five-week August recess.

"No, I’m not going to change my mind," he said of maintaining the hold. "First of all, I’ve had almost zero communication with the White House."

Motivating the hold is a Pentagon policy of providing paid leave for servicemembers to travel out of state to obtain an abortion. Tuberville contends the policy is unlawful, in light of the Hyde Amendment, a provision barring the use of federal funds for abortion.

Despite intense pressure, to reverse course, Tuberville has held firm on the matter, ultimately extracting a meeting with Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin earlier this month, though that meeting failed to produce a resolution to the standoff.

The Alabama lawmaker has refuted claims that the hold undermines military readiness, pointing to the presence of acting personnel in the officially vacant roles, some of whom Biden has tapped to fill the post permanently.

Tuberville further warned that he was prepared to maintain the hold for as long as necessary and warned White House officials that "[t]hey better start talking. It could go a long time if somebody don’t start the conversation."

Ben Whedon is an editor and reporter for Just the News. Follow him on Twitter.