The Senate Armed Services Committee on Tuesday sent President Trump’s pick for Army secretary, Mark Esper, and three other nominees to the Senate floor where they could receive a final confirmation vote as it ramps up work on filling top defense posts.
After a months-long hold on nominees by Sen. John McCain, his Armed Services Committee has moved those four Trump picks and held a hearing Tuesday on four more. Another hearing on four nominations is planned for Thursday.
McCain told the Washington Examiner that he plans to keep up the same brisk pace of hearings next week as about 70 percent of the 57 Senate-confirmed positions at the Defense Department must still be filled more than nine months into the Trump administration.
Esper, a top lobbyist for defense contractor Raytheon, must still have a vote on his nomination scheduled on the Senate floor, where Republicans have been pushing to speed up confirmations. He would be the top civilian in charge of the Army if named secretary, which is also the most senior Pentagon position that has yet to be filled.
The Senate was set to take a final confirmation vote Tuesday on John Gibson, the pick to be the Pentagon’s deputy chief management officer, who had been held up since July when Senate Armed Services reported his nomination to the floor.
McCain had criticized the Pentagon for months for not sharing information on military operations with the Senate, and had held the nominations as leverage. Last month he agreed to lift the hold after receiving a classified briefing on an ambush on U.S. troops in Niger and a visit from Defense Secretary Jim Mattis.
On Tuesday, Armed Services sent Esper’s nomination to the full chamber along with the nominations of Robert Wilkie, the nominee for undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness; Joseph Kernan, the nominee for undersecretary of defense for intelligence; and Guy Roberts, the nominee for assistant secretary of defense for nuclear, chemical and biological defense programs.
