{"id":4529,"date":"2026-07-15T10:07:00","date_gmt":"2026-07-15T10:07:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/metrotransitreview.com\/?p=4529"},"modified":"2026-07-15T10:07:00","modified_gmt":"2026-07-15T10:07:00","slug":"exclusive-thune-predicts-todd-blanche-and-jay-clayton-are-in-pretty-good-shape-ahead-of-fiery-confirmation-hearings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/metrotransitreview.com\/?p=4529","title":{"rendered":"Exclusive | Thune predicts Todd Blanche and Jay\u00a0Clayton are ‘in pretty good shape’ ahead of fiery confirmation hearings"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

WASHINGTON \u2014 Senate Majority Leader John Thune is feeling upbeat about the chances of Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche and Director of National Intelligence nominee Jay Clayton getting confirmed ahead of their hearings Wednesday.<\/p>\n

Read more Jihadi Hamas monsters have always blocked aid sent to Gaza \u2013 now the useless UN has finally admitted it<\/a><\/p>\n

Blanche was at the center of a GOP revolt last month over the since-scrapped DOJ $1.776 billion weaponization fund, and Clayton\u2019s confirmation was derailed after Trump demanded his pick to succeed the prosecutor at the Manhattan US Attorney\u2019s Office be approved first, allowing Bill Pulte to serve as acting DNI.<\/p>\n

\u201cI know Blanche\u2019s meetings are going really well. I mean, readouts have been real strong,\u201d Thune (R-SD) told The Post. \u201cAnd same thing with Clayton. I mean \u2026 he\u2019s been confirmed here before for SEC.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI think you know, barring something unforeseen at the confirmation hearings coming up this week, they should both be in pretty good shape, and my expectation is to try to move them before August break.\u201d<\/p>\n

Thune acknowledged that some lawmakers, such as Sens. Thom Tillis (R-NC) and John Cornyn (R-Texas), had expressed reservations about Blanche over the weaponization fund in the past, but he was told they were having \u201cvery good conversations\u201d with him.<\/p>\n

Blanche has been the acting head of the Justice Department since April 2, when Trump elevated him from his deputy attorney general post after firing Pam Bondi. The president tapped Blanche, his onetime personal attorney, to serve in his Cabinet permanently about two months later. <\/p>\n

Police unions representing more than 670,000 officers, 300 angel families and 100 bipartisan DOJ officials \u201cspanning the Reagan, H.W. Bush, Clinton, Bush, Obama, Trump and Biden administrations\u201d have all written to Congress voicing their support for Blanche\u2019s nomination, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) said Tuesday. <\/p>\n

Former Attorney General John Ashcroft, who served under former President George W. Bush; Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association President John Adler; and Jennifer Bos, the mother of a woman whose death was covered up by an illegal immigrant in Illinois, have been invited by Senate Judiciary Committee Republicans to testify in support of Blanche\u2019s nomination, according to Politico. <\/p>\n

Democrats on the panel are bringing in Dani Bensky, a victim of notorious sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein, and Liz Oyer, a former DOJ official, to testify in opposition to Blanche. <\/p>\n

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Their invitations suggest Democrats plan to attack Blanche\u2019s handling of the release of documents related to Epstein and accuse him of weaponizing the Justice Department in service of Trump. <\/p>\n

Oyer was \u201cfired by Blanche for refusing to rubberstamp gun ownership rights to Mel Gibson, a convicted domestic violence abuser and friend of Donald Trump,\u201d while Bensky had her name \u201cincluded in multiple batches of released Epstein Files,\u201d due to an apparent failure by the DOJ to redact her name from the documents, Senate Judiciary Committee ranking member Dick Durbin (D-Ill) said Monday. <\/p>\n

Thune does not expect any Democrats to vote in favor of either Blanche or Clayton.<\/p>\n

\n<\/div>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re both probably, you know, looking at party-line votes,\u201d he said, noting that Clayton\u2019s 2017 nomination to head the Securities and Exchange Commission garnered bipartisan support \u201cback when Democrats actually produced some votes for qualified nominees.\u201d<\/p>\n

After touting the work of Senate Republicans to confirm more than 500 executive branch nominations and 47 federal judges during Trump\u2019s second term \u2014 noting he has \u201canother 50 plus [nominations] teed up to go\u201d \u2014 Thune laid into Democrats once more. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhat\u2019s frustrating, obviously, is that everything takes longer than it should,\u201d Thune said, because Democrats have refused to confirm \u201ca single judge or a single civilian executive branch\u201d via unanimous consent.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re forcing us to go the long way on everything,\u201d he lamented.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re obstructing even qualified nominees, and it\u2019s really a sad commentary on kind of where the Democrat Party is \u2014 these people really have, in a lot of ways, lost their minds in the way that they\u2019re playing with, not just nominees, but other things.\u201d <\/p>\n

Read more Trump\u2019s defense reset drags US military tech into the 21st century<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Senate Majority Leader John Thune is upbeat about Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche and Director of National Intelligence nominee Jay Clayton getting confirmed ahead of their hearings Wednesday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4528,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4529","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics"],"yoast_head":"\nExclusive | Thune predicts Todd Blanche and Jay\u00a0Clayton are 'in pretty good shape' ahead of fiery confirmation hearings - Metro Transit Review<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/metrotransitreview.com\/?p=4529\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Exclusive | Thune predicts Todd Blanche and Jay\u00a0Clayton are 'in pretty good shape' ahead of fiery confirmation hearings - 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