Ron Johnson says Senate should defer to president’s picks after opposing Biden’s nominees

Wisconsin Republican Sen. Ron Johnson said on Nov. 17 that he intends to defer to President-elect Donald Trump’s decisions on appointments. By contrast, over the past four years, Johnson has repeatedly voted against confirming President Joe Biden’s nominees.

“I think the confirmation process has gotten completely out of control, way beyond what I think our founders ever envisioned. We have to confirm something like 1,200 positions in administration. I think elections matter. I think presidents ought to have the ability to staff their administrations,” Johnson told NewsNation host Chris Stirewalt. “Now again, we should be providing advice and consent on lifetime appointments and certainly the top administration officials. … My bias would be to vote for the people that President Trump wants to serve by him in his administration. Again, as a U.S. senator, I’m probably in the minority view here, I don’t particularly like being the human resource department of administration.”

Johnson praised Trump’s pick for attorney general, former Florida Republican U.S. Rep. Matt Gaetz, as “an incredibly effective advocate for the president” and said, “I can certainly understand why President Trump would want someone like Matt Gaetz in that position.” Gaetz, whose far-right voting record in Congress included being the only lawmaker in either party to vote against a law to combat human trafficking, had been under investigation by the House Ethics Committee over alleged sexual misconduct, drug use, and obstruction.

In a separate interview, Johnson praised Trump’s pick to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, anti-vaccine conspiracy theorist Robert F. Kennedy Jr., telling WISN-TV in Milwaukee, “I think he’ll do an extremely good job, because it’s kind of hard to refute the truth, and he’ll be laying out many truths.” Johnson has also frequently repeated misinformation about vaccines. 

While Johnson now says he favors congressional deference toward President Trump, he showed little deference for Biden’s nominations for administrative appointments.

Johnson voted against Biden’s nominees to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Interior Department, the Internal Revenue Service, the Labor Department, the Office of Government Ethics, and the Office of Management and Budget. 

He helped block the confirmation of Sopen Shah, Biden’s nominee to be U.S. attorney for the Western District of Wisconsin, and joined other Republicans in placing a hold on the nomination of Matthew Graves to be U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia as a way to extract information about Biden administration actions against participants in the storming of the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.  

Johnson voted against confirming Biden’s nominees for undersecretary of state for arms control and international security, for undersecretary of the Air Force, for ambassador-at-large for Arctic affairs, for legal adviser of the State Department, for governor of the U.S. Postal Service, and for member of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. 

In 2022, Johnson blocked the confirmation of a Biden judicial nominee, Milwaukee County Circuit Judge William Pocan, despite having recommended him for the job. Johnson claimed he had “been hearing concerns from the Green Bay legal community that they needed a judge who is locally based and actively involved in their community,” though Pocan had indicated he would move to Green Bay for the position. 

Johnson’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.