Blanche attorney general confirmation stalls over Senate GOP resistance

Chuck Grassley scrubbed a Senate Judiciary Committee vote on Todd Blanche’s attorney general nomination after two Republicans, John Cornyn of Texas and Thom Tillis of North Carolina, withheld support and pushed the confirmation into doubt. The postponed vote, which had been expected Thursday, marked an early test of whether President Donald Trump can keep his own party unified behind a Justice Department pick tied to one of his most controversial legal settlements.

Grassley, the Iowa Republican who chairs the committee, canceled the scheduled meeting late Wednesday, July 29, after Cornyn and Tillis made clear they were not ready to back Blanche. Their objection centered on a settlement involving Trump’s lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service and a roughly $1.8 billion, or nearly $2 billion, anti-weaponization fund that included language protecting Trump and members of his family from tax audits.

Cornyn said the Justice Department had not adequately addressed his concerns in writing. He also canceled a planned meeting with Blanche ahead of the committee vote, underscoring how far the resistance had hardened before the nomination could even reach the Senate floor. Blanche and other administration officials had been pressing for support, but the two senators wanted clearer assurances from the Justice Department before allowing the nomination to advance.

The dispute reached a head after Blanche’s July 15 confirmation hearing, where he faced sharp questioning over his role in the Trump-IRS settlement while serving as acting attorney general. Blanche defended himself at the hearing, but he also resisted requests for a formal written retraction, leaving Democrats and some Republicans unconvinced that he had fully answered for the arrangement.

The delay was a rare setback for Trump’s attorney general pick and left Blanche’s path uncertain as the White House and Justice Department weighed whether to satisfy the GOP holdouts. For Trump, the fight carried broader significance than a single nomination: attorney general is the job that would steer the federal law enforcement agenda, and the objections from Cornyn and Tillis showed that even in a Republican-controlled Senate, party loyalty was not enough to erase concerns about the handling of a settlement that shielded the president’s family from tax scrutiny.