WASHINGTON -- Republicans jammed two of President Donald Trump's top Cabinet picks through the Senate Finance Committee with no Democrats in the room Wednesday after suspending a rule that otherwise would have barred them from taking the votes.
Elsewhere, one Senate panel signed off on Trump's choice for attorney general only after senators exchanged heated words, and another committee postponed a vote on the would-be chief of the Environmental Protection Agency after Democrats refused to show up.
Busting through a Democratic boycott of the Finance Committee, all 14 Republicans took advantage of Democrats' absence to disable temporarily a committee rule requiring at least one Democrat to be present for votes.
Sen. Johnny Isakson, R-Ga., moved to suspend the rules on these nominees specifically, and all rules that apply to them going forward. Hatch said the rare measure was approved by the Senate parliamentarian.
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They then used two 14-0 roll-call votes to approve Steve Mnuchin for treasury secretary and Rep. Tom Price, R-Ga., to be health and human services secretary, ignoring Democrats' demands that the two nominees provide more information about their financial backgrounds.
All of the nominations will need full Senate approval.
"We took some unprecedented actions today due to the unprecedented obstruction on the part of our colleagues," Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, said in a statement. "Republicans on this committee showed up to do our jobs. Yesterday, rather than accept anything less than their desired outcome, our Democrat colleagues chose to cower in the hallway and hold a press conference."
Hatch later told reporters that Democrats should be "ashamed" for staying away from his committee's meeting.
"I don't feel a bit sorry for them," he said, adding later, "I don't care what they want at this point."
Democrats were told Wednesday morning that the committee would reconvene, but they were not given any indication that Hatch planned to alter the rules to approve the nominees, according to a Democratic spokesman.
The top Democrat on the Finance Committee, Ron Wyden of Oregon, assailed the Republican actions to approve Mnuchin and Price without Democrats present.
"Today, for the 1st time in history, Senate Finance Cmte broke the rules to push through, on a partisan basis, 2 nominees who misled the Cmte," Wyden tweeted.
He complained that Mnuchin had misled the committee by initially misstating his personal wealth on a financial disclosure form, and misrepresenting under oath how OneWest Bank,which he led as chairman and chief executive officer, scrutinized mortgage documents. And Wyden pointed to a series of discounted stock buys Price made in a health care company, first reported by the Wall Street Journal.
Trump won one major victory, as the Senate confirmed Rex Tillerson to be secretary of state. The mostly party-line 56-43 vote came with Democrats critical of Tillerson's close ties to Russia as former Exxon Mobil CEO. Sens. John Boozman and Tom Cotton, both Republicans from Arkansas, backed the confirmation.
Several Democrats sided with Republicans to approve Tillerson, including senators from states that Trump won during the election: Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota and Joe Manchin of West Virginia. Angus King, an independent from Maine, and Mark Warner of Virginia also supported Tillerson.
Tillerson was quickly sworn in during a ceremony in the Oval Office, where Trump showered him with praise.
"You understand that the job of our diplomats and the mission of the State Department is to serve the interests of the United States of America to make our nation safer, our country more prosperous and our country much more secure," the president told him. "I do believe we can achieve peace and stability in these very, very troubled times."
But the prospects that GOP donor Betsy DeVos would win approval as education secretary were jarred when two GOP senators, Susan Collins of Maine and Alaska's Lisa Murkowski, said they opposed her. Both challenged her support for public education, and their objections meant Vice President Mike Pence might need to break a tie in a Senate that Republicans control 52-48.
"Democrats are going to keep fighting back," said Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash. "We are going to stand with people across the country. And we will keep pushing Republicans to put country above party, and stand with us."
With Tillerson, six high-ranking Trump nominees have been approved by the full Senate: Elaine Chao as transportation secretary; retired Gens. John Kelly and Jim Mattis at the Department of Homeland Security and the Pentagon; Mike Pompeo to lead the CIA; and Nikki Haley to serve as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.
Sessions advances
The Senate Judiciary Committee used a party-line 11-9 vote to sign off on Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala., for attorney general.
"Senator Sessions has devoted his life to public service, and his qualifications cannot be questioned," Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn, R-Texas, said in a statement after the Sessions vote. "He has a history of protecting and defending the Constitution and the rule of law for all people."
The Judiciary Committee vote also came two days after Trump ousted Sally Yates, a holdover from President Barack Obama's administration who was serving as acting attorney general. Yates had refused to defend the president's order on refugees, saying its legality was unclear. The White House accused her of having "betrayed" her department.
Democrats zeroed in Yates' dismissal and said that Sessions, an early supporter of Trump's campaign, would not have the independence to challenge the White House on questions of the law and policy. At his confirmation hearing last month, Sessions pledged repeatedly that he would be able to "say no" to Trump if needed and would not be "a mere rubber stamp" on issues like immigration and national security.
The debate turned ugly as committee members traded personal barbs and accusations of "untoward" behavior. The jousting started when Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn., began challenging Sessions' civil-rights record and claimed that another committee member, Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, had "misrepresented" the issue.
Cruz wasn't present as Franken spoke. Cornyn interrupted Franken twice, calling it "untoward and inappropriate" to disparage the absent Cruz.
Franken said Cruz "personally went after me, he personally impugned my integrity." Angrily pointing at Cornyn, he asked, "You didn't object then, did you?"
Cornyn said he wasn't sure he was there when Cruz spoke.
Sen. Charles Grassley, the committee chairman, told the two senators that "we'd be better off if we just let it go."
At the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, Democrats boycotted a planned vote on Scott Pruitt, Oklahoma's attorney general, who is in line to lead the Environmental Protection Agency. The vote was postponed.
Pruitt has questioned the scientific consensus that human activities are contributing to global warming and joined lawsuits against the agency's emission curbs.
Sen. Tom Carper of Delaware, the top Democrat on the Environment and Public Works Committee, said outside the committee hearing room that Pruitt's answers were "at best incomplete and evasive." He added, "We need the truth."
Sen. John Barrasso, a Republican from Wyoming who heads the committee, called the Democratic blockade "a disappointing turn of events" and said it would keep the EPA rudderless at a critical time. "This amounts to nothing more than political theater at the expense of working on issues we care about."
Another panel postponed a vote on Trump's pick to head the White House Budget Office, Rep. Mick Mulvaney, R-S.C., as Democrats asked for more time to read the nominee's FBI file.
Information for this article was contributed by Alan Fram, Richard Lardner, Mary Clare Jalonick and Michael Biesecker of The Associated Press; by Kelsey Snell, David Weigel, Ed O'Keefe and Sean Sullivan of The Washington Post; by Eric Lichtblau of The New York Times; and by Jennifer A. Dlouhy and Ari Natter of Bloomberg News.
A Section on 02/02/2017