Sarah Binder

Senate Republicans made headlines yesterday morning for invoking the so-called “Thurmond Rule,” a practice in which the Senate opposition party within six months of a presidential election often refuses to allow votes on nominations to vacancies on the Courts of Appeals.  In more basic terms, opposition party senators in the run up to a presidential […]

Jon Bernstein has an interesting post up today about the thawing of the Senate confirmation process.  Bernstein attributes today’s confirmation of two Federal Reserve nominees, as well as a spate of April nominations, to the president’s aggressive use of the recess appointment power in January. If Republicans know that Obama is willing to use his […]

The Senate readily confirmed Jerome Stein and Jay Powell to the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve yesterday, with each securing 70 or more votes for confirmation.  With these two new governors, the Fed returns to its full complement of seven governors for the first time since 2006.  Obama’s willingness to pair a Democratic […]

The Common Cause lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the Senate filibuster has focused attention on the origins of the filibuster—with important reactions by Greg Koger, Steve Smith, and Ezra Klein. Because I hate to miss a scuffle over Senate rules in 1806, I thought I’d weigh in as well. Greg yesterday took issue with Common […]

The big news out of yesterday’s Bernanke presser was the Krugman-Bernanke-Krugman not-so-close encounter over the Fed’s stand pat stance in face of a still sluggish economy and high unemployment.  Krugman assailed Bernanke for forgetting the lessons he taught as a professor about aggressive central banking, Bernanke maintained that he’s been entirely consistent, and Krugman elevated […]

Just in time celebration of Pi Day, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nevada) has given the Senate its own special math problem.  Reid filed cloture motions yesterday on 17 nominees to the U.S. District Courts currently pending on the Senate’s Executive Calendar.  If Democrats secure sixty votes on each cloture vote, the Senate would be […]

President Obama gave a recess appointment to Richard Cordray to serve as director of the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau established under Dodd-Frank.  With Senate Republicans vowing to oppose any nominee absent structural reform of the CFPB, a Republican filibuster last month blocked the Senate from securing cloture on Cordray’s nomination.  Because recess appointments last […]

With all twelve appointees selected for the Super Committee (aka the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction), we can map the general ideological makeup of the panel (with apologies for the less than aesthetically appealing figure below).   For now, we can set aside the strengths and weaknesses of various methods of calculating legislative voting […]