During a recent appearance on Morning Joe, John Kirby — a spokesperson in the Biden administration affiliated with the National Security Council — went after the actions of Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.), who has been refusing to allow for the ordinarily quick confirmations of hundreds of selections for various military roles.
Tuberville has expressed his opposition in a process that routinely moves forward without such a hitch because of support made available from the Defense Department for personnel seeking an abortion. They’re not directly funding the care, but coverage of travel costs has been offered amid some states taking the post-Dobbs opportunity to impose their own limits. Tuberville’s debilitating objections to the confirmations of military officers leave the Senate with options that require significantly longer time, and time is a precious resource in the Senate, which sometimes faces allegations of dysfunction.
In comments highlighted earlier by The Hill, Kirby argued that Tuberville was effectively himself politicizing deliberations around the military. “His very action is politicizing the military because he’s making it about the Pentagon’s policy rules for reproductive care for women service members,” Kirby told viewers.
“You’re talking about several hundred officers now that can’t move on to the next job, and — this is important — can’t move on to the next rank,” he added. “When you’re in an acting capacity, while you can do many of the things that a person who is confirmed can do, some of your authorities are limited. Some of your ability to maneuver money around and program things are going to be affected by the fact that you’re not Senate confirmed.”
Other Republicans in the Senate have expressed opposition to Tuberville’s persistence, but that’s about it. The Alabama Senator has also recently faced controversy for struggling with the basic question of whether white nationalists are racists. He also struggled with grasping the basic definition of white nationalism, arguing in some recent discussions that it wasn’t even inherently a matter of believing in racial superiority. The definition for white nationalism, though, is well established and has been for, well, ages. It’s not promising for a member of the U.S. Senate to be fumbling on such basic issues.
