The humble Senate blue slip becomes linchpin of Trump's DNI crash out

WASHINGTON (CN) — The Senate reeled on Wednesday morning after President Donald Trump's surprise announcement that he was canceling a hearing to examine his nominee for director of national intelligence, a move that was not only unexpected but appeared to jeopardize bipartisan talks aimed at renewing lapsed government surveillance powers.

Undergirding the chaos, which elicited confusion from Republicans and consternation from Democrats, was Trump's longstanding grievance with an arcane Senate tradition: the blue slip.

In a Truth Social post early Wednesday, the president said he would "not be going forward" with Jay Clayton's nomination to serve as director of national intelligence, even as the nominee was scheduled to appear before the Senate Intelligence Committee later that day. Clayton, currently serving as U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, was tapped to replace Bill Pulte — slated to take over as acting DNI on Friday.

But the president said that he didn't want to take Clayton away from the federal prosecutors' office until his replacement, private practice attorney Jamie McDonald, is confirmed by the Senate.

"Regarding the approval of our Great Patriot, Jay Clayton, we are cancelling the Senate Hearing RE: DNI today and will not be going forward until Jamie McDonald is approved to be U.S. Attorney," wrote Trump.

Standing in the president's way, however, is the Senate blue slip.

A century-old tradition, the blue slip serves as a mechanism for the Senate's minority party to exercise some oversight over certain presidential nominees in their home states. The practice is effectively a veto by which a single lawmaker can withhold approval for federal district court and U.S. attorney nominees, such as McDonald.

Both Democrats and Republicans have historically wielded the blue slip as a partisan cudgel against presidential nominees. And New York's Democratic senators — Kirsten Gillibrand and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer — are unlikely to offer their support to Trump's replacement for Clayton.

Trump, who wrote Wednesday that McDonald "must be confirmed and blue slipped," appeared to acknowledge that the tradition, and staunch support for the practice among top Republicans, would nevertheless stymie his efforts.

"Because of the ridiculous views of Republicans on blue slipping … I may not be able to get the extraordinary Sullivan & Cromwell Partner, Jamie, approved," wrote the president. Trump also erroneously claimed that Democrats "are often willing to nix" the blue slip for Republicans.

The president has for his entire second term raged against the Senate blue slip, which he's called a "hoax" and urged Republicans to abandon entirely. But his quixotic campaign against the tradition continues to fall on deaf ears.

"I think it's a dead issue," North Carolina Senator Thom Tillis told Courthouse News. "He apparently doesn't think it's dead yet."

Tillis, a Republican who sits on the Senate Judiciary Committee, took aim at the White House, which he said was "not dialing the president into the complexities of what he's done here" in pulling Clayton's nomination and conditioning it on McDonald's confirmation as U.S. attorney. He pointed out that Clayton himself was never officially confirmed as a federal prosecutor thanks to the blue slip — he was instead appointed by a panel of judges on the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.

"The president — or whoever advised him on this — has unilaterally decided that this post is not going to get filled," the North Carolina Republican fumed.

Trump's crusade against the Senate blue slip has also met a roadblock in the form of Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley, the GOP chairman of the Judiciary Committee. The top Senate Republican has repeatedly defended the tradition and pointed out that, even without a blue slip, any nominee that faced opposition from home state senators would not be confirmed in the full chamber.

Reached for comment Wednesday, a spokesperson for Grassley's office directed Courthouse News to the committee chairman's past comments in defense of the blue slip practice.

Judiciary Committee Democrats, for their part, dismissed the president's refreshed fury about the blue slip and appeared confident their Republican colleagues would hold fast.

"They stood pretty firmly in favor of it," Connecticut Senator Richard Blumental told Courthouse News, pointing out that Trump has "repeatedly" attacked the blue slip process. "It seems to be a sort of pet peeve, but the Senate is the Senate. We're not lap dogs for the president."

Rhode Island Senator Sheldon Whitehouse agreed, saying he expected Republicans to continue defending blue slips.

"I think he's full of madcap ideas that have very little support," he said of the president.

Meanwhile, the Senate Intelligence Committee on Wednesday afternoon announced that Clayton had been instructed by Trump not to appear for his scheduled nomination hearing. The panel had initially indicated that his hearing would continue as planned unless the president withdrew Clayton from consideration.

"It's regrettable that the president has directed Jay Clayton not to appear at his confirmation hearing today," Arkansas Senator Tom Cotton, the panel chairman, said in a statement. "Mr. Clayton is a patriot and a highly qualified nominee, as the president has said repeatedly."

Cotton said Clayton's nomination would proceed "in the near future."

Trump's DNI fracas threatens to sink tenuous negotiations in the Senate over efforts to renew Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, a measure which authorizes broad spy powers for U.S. intelligence agencies. Democrats have refused to back any bill approving FISA authority — which lapsed last week — unless the White House walked back Pulte as its pick for acting DNI.

Clayton was seen as an acceptable compromise that might convince some Democrats to get on board with renewing the FISA spy powers.

McDonald, Trump's nominee for the Southern District of New York, has not yet had his appointment formally sent to the Senate Judiciary Committee, a source familiar with the matter told Courthouse News.