The White House is losing control of its own messaging over Neera Tanden’s nomination to head the Office of Management and Budget as her confirmation by the full Senate seems more and more unlikely.
Democrats have argued that Tanden’s Twitter rhetoric, in which she sharply criticized Republican officials and even some Democrats, isn’t any different from the online screeds of former President Donald Trump. But White House press secretary Jen Psaki has not sounded that message from the White House podium. Other than calling the nominee qualified and a beneficiary of government programs as a child that she would help oversee, team Biden has yet to explain fully why it is willingly taking so much bipartisan fire over this specific nominee and appearing so hellbent on sending what would be a politically damaged budget chief into such an important role.
“When Neera Tanden testified just a few weeks ago, she apologized for her past comments,” Psaki said Thursday regarding Tanden’s tone. “And that she would be joining an administration where, as we’ve noted in here, there’s an expectation of a high bar of civility and engagement, whether that’s on social media or in person.”
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Other Democrats contend the pushback on Tanden’s nomination due to her Twitter language is tinged with sexism, another claim Psaki hasn’t repeated in the press briefing room or during television interviews. The press secretary used a Thursday morning appearance on The View to declare administration officials were still “fighting our hearts out” to get Tanden confirmed.
“The president was proud to nominate a historic set of nominees who not only were — many of them were barrier breaking, including Neera Tanden, but also incredibly qualified and experienced,” Psaki said a day earlier. “And he certainly believes that members of the Senate are going to consider them and should — will continue to consider them with the best of intention.”
With the Senate so narrowly divided and dependent on Vice President Kamala Harris’s tiebreaking vote for Democratic control, the White House has reasons to remain diplomatic in its rhetoric. But the lack of coordination or a forceful defense appears to be hurting chances for Tanden’s confirmation rather than helping secure it.
Republican strategist John Feehery, though, does not believe the White House had many options to respond to the dissent to Tanden’s nomination.
“All politics is personal, and Tanden has very sharp elbows. Live by the tweet, and die by the tweet,” he told the Washington Examiner.
For Feehery, OMB was “a curious spot for her anyway.” White House chief of staff Ron Klain this week even suggested that if Tanden wasn’t confirmed, President Biden would find another role for her within his administration that didn’t require the Senate’s consent.
“She should be one Biden’s top political advisers, not a budget person,” Feehery said. “She has too high a public profile to be the OMB director, and her talents really lie with framing messages and doing outreach to corporate America. She doesn’t seem like a green eyeshade person to me.”
Other Republicans warn against oversimplifying the problems with Tanden to just her online expression.
“She’s a conspiracy theorist with a phone book of management and temperament problems. Her tweets aren’t the #1 problem,” strategist Josh Holmes, ironically, wrote on Twitter.
I don’t think I’m on a short-list for OMB either way but where I disagree with @hughhewitt (who I think the world of) is you can’t reduce Neera’s nom to tweets. She’s a conspiracy theorist with a phone book of management and temperament problems. Her tweets aren’t the #1 problem
— Josh Holmes (@HolmesJosh) February 24, 2021
But it was Tanden’s tweets that Republicans on the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee, as well as the Senate’s Budget panel, fixated on during her two days of hearings this month.
“I’m very disturbed about your personal comments about people,” Louisiana Republican Sen. John Kennedy said during her appearance before the Budget Committee. “I mean, you called Sen. Sanders everything but an ignorant slut,” he went on, referring to socialist Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders.
And old online missives from Interior Secretary nominee Deb Haaland were similarly dragged back into public view during her hearing this week before the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, including one last year in which she stated, “Republicans don’t believe in science.”
Tanden’s Twitter profile was mentioned, too, in the statement from Democratic West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin when he announced last week he would not back her nomination.
“I have carefully reviewed Neera Tanden’s public statements and tweets that were personally directed towards my colleagues on both sides of the aisle from Sen. Sanders to Sen. McConnell and others,” Manchin wrote, alluding to the budget chairman and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. “I believe her overtly partisan statements will have a toxic and detrimental impact on the important working relationship between members of Congress and the next director of the Office of Management and Budget.”
After Manchin pulled his support, Republican Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Mitt Romney of Utah, key swing Republican votes, did the same.
A spokesperson for the Utah Republican noted Romney “has been critical of extreme rhetoric from prior nominees, and this is consistent with that position. He believes it’s hard to return to comity and respect with a nominee who has issued a thousand mean tweets.”
Collins questioned Tanden’s credentials on top of her temperament, contending that deleting posts in preparation for her confirmation raised “concerns about her commitment to transparency.” Now, given the 50-50 seat tie in the Senate, Tanden’s fate most likely hinges on Alaska Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski, whom she described in 2017 as being “high” on “her own supply” for endorsing legislation that lowered corporate tax rates.
A Republican operative texted the Washington Examiner an explanation: “Media covers it one rudimentary way, so Republicans respond that way. Democrats then echo the rudimentary argument. Rinse. Repeat.”
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Tanden has denied coordinating with the White House when she decided to delete some of her sharpest tweets. The White House, too, has denied underestimating the issues they would create.
“The president nominated Neera Tanden because she is qualified, because she is experienced, because she has a record of working with people who agree with her and disagree with her,” Psaki said Thursday. “Plus, she has lived experience of her own, having benefited from a number of the programs that she would oversee as a daughter of a single parent and somebody who benefited from food stamps at certain points in time.”
“She would bring a new perspective to the role,” the press secretary added. “That’s why he nominated her to the job and why we’re continuing to fight for her confirmation.”
