By MARY CLARE JALONICK

WASHINGTON (AP) — Republican senators say they are prepared to change the chamber’s rules to get around the Democratic blockade of President Donald Trump’s nominees and are discussing a proposal to make it easier to confirm multiple nominees at once.

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The Democrats’ obstruction is “historic and unprecedented,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune said after meeting with his conference on Wednesday. “It is not something we can sustain.”

Republicans have been talking about options for changing the rules since early August, when the Senate left for a monthlong recess after a breakdown in bipartisan negotiations over the confirmation process. Democrats have blocked nearly every single one of Trump’s nominees, forcing majority Republicans to spend valuable floor time on procedural votes and leaving many positions in the executive branch unfilled.

GOP senators discussed one proposal in a private meeting on Wednesday that would enable them to confirm large tranches of nominees “en bloc,” or several at once, if a majority of senators agree, according to multiple senators who attended the meeting.

Currently, the objection of a single senator forces multiple votes on most nominations. The rules change would likely only apply to executive branch nominations, not lifetime judicial appointments, and would exclude many of the most high-profile positions, such as Cabinet nominees, that require a longer debate time.

The rules change would require several floor votes and the support of a simple majority, so at least 51 out of the chamber’s 53 Republicans. But most GOP senators appear to be on board.

“Expect us to move forward with a plan that would enable us to clear the backlog of nominees,” Thune said after the GOP conference meeting. “It just flat has to happen.”

Republicans said after the meeting that they discussed proposals that they knew they would have to live with under Democratic presidents, as well.

“You always worry about what’s going to happen when the shoe is on the other foot, but this is historic obstruction,” said Wyoming Sen. John Barrasso, the No. 2 Republican.

The latest standoff comes as Democrats and Republicans have gradually escalated their obstruction of the other party’s executive branch and judicial nominees over the last two decades, and as Senate leaders in both parties have changed the rules every few years to confirm more nominees without bipartisan support.

In 2013, Democrats changed Senate rules for lower court judicial nominees to remove the 60-vote threshold for confirmations as Republicans blocked President Barack Obama’s judicial picks. In 2017, Republicans did the same for Supreme Court nominees as Democrats tried to block Trump’s nomination of Justice Neil Gorsuch.

While Senate Republicans blocked many of President Joe Biden’s nominees, forcing similar delays in confirmations, Democrats have blocked almost all of Trump’s picks. It’s the first time in recent history that the minority party hasn’t allowed at least some quick confirmations.

The delays have infuriated Trump, who told Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer to “GO TO HELL!” in a social media post after negotiations broke down over the process in early August.

Schumer said then that a rules change would be a “huge mistake,” especially as Senate Republicans will need Democratic votes to pass spending bills and other legislation moving forward.

Schumer said in a Wednesday statement that Republicans’ proposed plan “guts the Senate’s constitutional role of advice and consent, weakens our checks and balances, and guarantees that historically bad nominees will only get worse with even less oversight.”

But Republicans say they are loosely basing their plan on legislation proposed by Democratic Sen. Amy Klobuchar in 2023, as Republicans blocked Biden nominees, to streamline Senate confirmations by allowing up to 10 nominees to be considered at the same time.

“The slowdown of the confirmation process that we’ve seen in the Senate under the last several administrations is preventing key officials from taking up their positions,” Klobuchar said at the time. “This commonsense reform will help improve efficiency and make sure we’re able to fill positions that are vital to our national security, economic success, and more.”

Republicans said their proposal could go beyond 10 nominees at once, however — potentially clearing the way for Republicans to move more than 100 pending nominations in the coming weeks.

Sen. John Hoeven, R-N.D., said Republicans are hoping to move “sooner, not later — we need to get caught up.”

By MATT BROWN and KEVIN FREKING

WASHINGTON (AP) — The House rejected a resolution to censure Rep. LaMonica McIver, D-N.J., and remove her from a committee that oversees immigration and national security as she faces federal charges stemming from a visit to an immigration detention facility.

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The House voted 215-207 to table the measure, a sign that some were uncomfortable moving forward with censure while McIver’s case is still pending in the courts. A trial in her case has been scheduled for November.

Democratic lawmakers unanimously voted to table the resolution, which was sponsored by Rep. Clay Higgins, R-La. Five Republicans joined them and two others voted present. As the resolution was being read, some Democrats were incensed. “Liar,” some shouted; “Shame,” yelled one Democratic lawmaker. Many Republicans streamed out of the chamber before the vote concluded. Democrats cheered and hugged at the final tally’s reading.

“The censure attempt against me has failed. Rightfully so. It was a baseless, partisan effort to shut me up,” McIver wrote on social media after the vote. “I was not elected to play political games — I was elected to serve. I won’t back down. Not now. Not ever.”

Republicans sought to punish McIver for a confrontation with federal law enforcement during a congressional visit to a new immigration detention facility in Newark, N.J. McIver has pleaded not guilty to federal charges accusing her of assaulting and interfering with immigration officers outside the facility.

The censure resolution recounted how McIver is alleged to have interfered with Homeland Security Investigations officials’ ability to arrest an unauthorized visitor. It said she is alleged to have slammed her forearm into the body and forcibly grabbed an HSI officer. The resolution also said body camera and other video evidence supported the allegations made in the federal indictment.

The measure said such actions did not reflect credibly on the House and that her continued service on the House Homeland Security Committee was a significant conflict of interest. The committee’s portfolio includes oversight of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency, which operates the detention center that McIver tried to enter.

The effort had the backing of GOP leadership. Some Republicans expressed dismay with the outcome.

“We have a member of Congress who assaulted an ICE officer. I don’t even know what we’re doing anymore,” said Rep. Byron Donalds of Florida.

Donalds said he did not know why some Republicans broke ranks to back the motion to table the censure resolution.

Democratic Rep. Yvette Clarke, chair of the Congressional Black Caucus, said the McIver vote was “a breath of fresh air in such a toxic environment.”

McIver won a special election last year after Democratic Rep. Donald Payne Jr. died in office. She won a full two-year term in November.

McIver was joined by two other New Jersey Democrats, Reps. Bonnie Watson Coleman and Rob Menendez, during a visit to a privately owned 1,000-bed facility that ICE is using as a detention center. Newark’s mayor, Democrat Ras Baraka, was arrested after officials determined he was not authorized to enter. That charge was later dropped. Baraka is suing over what he said was a malicious prosecution.

Parts of the confrontation can be seen on a nearly two-minute video clip from the visit released by the Department of Homeland Security.

The video shows McIver on the facility side of a chain-link fence just before Baraka’s arrest on the street side of the fence, where other people had been protesting. She and uniformed officials are seen going through a fence gate, and she joins others shouting that they should circle the mayor. The video then shows McIver in a tightly packed group of people and officers. At one point, her left elbow and then her right elbow push into an officer wearing a dark face covering and an olive green uniform with the word “Police” on it.

McIver was indicted on three counts of assaulting, resisting, impeding and interfering with federal officials. Two of the counts carry a maximum sentence of up to eight years in prison. The third is a misdemeanor with a maximum punishment of one year in prison.

Higgins said he would not have moved forward with the resolution if McIver had withdrawn from the Homeland Security panel pending a resolution of the federal charges against her. He said it was a conflict for her to serve on a panel with oversight authority over the agencies at the center of her criminal investigation.

“We didn’t expect it to fail. We knew it would be close, but it’s quite disappointing,” Higgins said.

The House has censured members on 28 occasions before, but the punishment has increasingly been delivered on a partisan basis in recent years.

Democrats retaliated just hours before the McIver vote with the introduction of a censure resolution against Rep. Cory Mills, R-Fla., who has been accused by a beauty pageant titleholder of threatening to release intimate videos and private images of her after she ended their romantic relationship, according to a report filed with law enforcement. Mills has denied the allegations.

Mills is also facing an ethics investigation into whether he violated campaign finance laws or held federal contracts while in office.

Democratic efforts to put the spotlight on Mills seemed to serve as a warning to Republicans that they were prepared to undertake similar censure resolutions in response to the targeting of McIver.

“There are colleagues on the other side of the aisle that have very serious charges against them, and we don’t want to have to unpack that for the American people,” Clarke said.

By JOSH FUNK

OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — The Transportation Department is going to train 163 track inspectors to dramatically increase the number of people who know how to spot critical problems with railroad bridges, but the railroads themselves will still be responsible for inspecting their own bridges and the results will still be kept confidential.

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Currently, there are only seven Federal Railroad Administration employees trained to assess bridges, although their primary responsibility is to review each railroad’s inspection plan to make sure they have a good plan in place and that won’t change. But this move will train significantly more people to spot structural problems on railroad bridges while they are out inspecting the tracks. Both federal and state track inspectors will be trained.

“The Trump Administration is delivering on its promises to make government more efficient and keep travelers safe,” Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said. “Leveraging our existing, dedicated workforce to improve oversight of railroad bridge safety is another common-sense win for Americans.”

Jared Cassity, who is the National Safety Director for the nation’s largest rail union, SMART-TD, agreed that having more people trained to spot bridge problems is a good thing, but these inspectors still have more than 70,000 railroad bridges out there across the country to assess.

“The safety of the railroad system relies upon a multitude of components, but few are as critical to the public and the men and women we represent as the integrity of the bridges America’s trains traverse,” said Cassity, whose union represents conductors.

Because there are so few bridge inspectors at the Federal Railroad Administration, roughly 10% of U.S. railroads have not had their bridge management programs audited even 15 years after the rule on Bridge Safety Standards went into effect. But that issue is primarily at smaller short-line railroads. The Federal Railroad Administration said that the biggest railroads that deliver more than 90% of the nation’s freight have all been audited on a regular basis.

But there have still been high-profile rail bridge collapses like the one in Montana two years ago that sent a train hauling petroleum products into the Yellowstone River, sending tar balls downstream that had to be cleaned up. An Oregon railroad bridge maintained by a short-line railroad also collapsed earlier this year underneath a train — three years after it caught fire.

FILE – A Metro-North Railroad passenger train travels on the Moodna Viaduct steel railroad trestle in Cornwall, New York, April 27, 2023. (AP Photo/Ted Shaffrey, File)

Congress required the railroads to keep bridge inspection reports confidential because of concerns that a terrorist could use them to pinpoint vulnerable bridges. There are provisions of the law that allow state and local officials to request the reports, but those officials have often complained that it is still hard to get that information.

The Association of American Railroads trade group said this move to get more inspectors trained will help ensure rail bridges are safe.

“This important step complements the industry’s own comprehensive bridge management safety programs and rigorous inspections, which will further validate the thousands of rail bridges that keep our economy moving remain structurally sound and properly maintained,” association spokeswoman Jessica Kahanek said.

An Illinois man is charged with felony threats of violence against Minnesota’s lieutenant governor in the wake of last week’s mass shooting at Annunciation Catholic Church in Minneapolis.

Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan posted to X, formerly Twitter, on Aug. 27 after the shooting that killed two students and injured another 21 people. She said her heart went out to those affected and asked people to join her in prayer.

A person commented on Flanagan’s post: “You should be genuinely shot and killed,” according to the criminal complaint filed Wednesday by the Ramsey County Attorney’s Office.

Flanagan made another post on X thanking police, emergency healthcare workers and clergy.

The same account commented: “Children’s blood is on your hands and soon it will be coming out of your mouth and (expletive) throat as we beat you,” the complaint said. It added that the person also wrote, “You should be strung up by the neck …”

A Minnesota State Patrol trooper working at the Capitol district was assigned the case after a Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension criminal intelligence analyst reported their open source aggregation system alerted them to a threatening post.

BCA staff identified the X user by an IP address as Caden J. Sluder, 22, of Oglesby, Ill., the complaint said.

The trooper called a phone number for Sluder on Aug. 27 about his posts. “Sluder said it was a joke,” according to the complaint. “I’m not actually gonna (expletive) do anything. I’m not crazy.”

He said he was “pissed off and Christians got killed in Minnesota and the Lieutenant Governor was wearing a trans shirt.”

The 23-year-old shooter at the church died by suicide afterward. The shooter’s mother had filed a petition for a name change for the suspect from Robert Westman to Robin Westman, noting Robin Westman identified as female, at age 17.

Flanagan has been pictured in the past wearing shirts that say, “Protect Trans Kids.”

Sluder told the trooper “he lives far away and had no intention of traveling to Minnesota to commit the crimes,” the complaint said, adding that he apologized multiple times. He said “he was making a joke, was very frustrated, and expressed his freedom of speech.”

A warrant has been issued for Sluder’s arrest. The Pioneer Press could not reach him for comment Wednesday.

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