Politics

Neera Tanden Was ‘Proud To Fight’ Against Trump Cabinet Picks, Now She’s Battling To Save Her Own Nomination

REUTERS/REUTERS/Mike Segar

Daily Caller News Foundation logo
Chuck Ross Investigative Reporter
Font Size:
  • Neera Tanden’s nomination to serve as White House budget director is in jeopardy after Sen. Joe Manchin came out against her confirmation. 
  • Opposition to Senate-confirmed positions is nothing new for Tanden, who said in early 2017 that she was “fighting hard” against Trump’s pick to lead the Department of Education. 
  • Tanden, the president of the Center for American Progress, also said that she was “proud to fight” against Jeff Sessions for attorney general. 

Neera Tanden, the Biden nominee for White House budget director, said in early 2017 she was “proud to fight” against Donald Trump’s nominee for attorney general, and that her organization, the Center for American Progress, was “fighting hard” to block Trump’s nominee for secretary of education.

Now, Tanden is at the center of a different fight: salvaging her nomination as director of the Office of Management and Budget, a Cabinet-level position that requires Senate confirmation.

Tanden’s confirmation is in limbo after West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin, a Democrat, said Friday that he will vote against Tanden due to her “overtly political statements” about Sen. Bernie Sanders and Sen. Mitch McConnell.

“I believe her overtly partisan statements will have a toxic and detrimental impact on the important working relationship between members of Congress and the next director of the Office of Management and Budget,” said Manchin, a moderate Democrat. (RELATED: Manchin Opposes OMB Pick Neera Tanden)

Tanden, a former Bill Clinton White House aide who is president of the Center for American Progress (CAP), has come under scrutiny because of her bombastic tweets criticizing Republicans. She also was highly critical of Sanders during his 2016 presidential bid, blaming him and his supporters for undermining Hillary Clinton’s candidacy.

Republicans and some progressive Democrats have also questioned millions of dollars in corporate and foreign government donations given to CAP during Tanden’s tenure. Tanden also pushed the now-debunked allegation that the Trump campaign conspired with the Russian government to influence the 2016 election.

During her confirmation hearing on Feb. 9, Missouri Sen. Josh Hawley quizzed Tanden over funding CAP accepted from Big Tech companies and the United Arab Emirates.

Tanden apologized for her politically-tinged tweets during the confirmation hearing and denied that CAP’s funders had any influence on the think tank’s mission.

President Joe Biden said Friday he has no intention of pulling Tanden’s nomination and expressed confidence that she will be confirmed to the post.

“I think that we are going to find the votes and get her confirmed,” he told reporters on Friday.

Tanden will need all remaining Democrats, at least one Republican, and Sanders, an Independent, to vote for her confirmation if she is to take office.

Sanders, who is chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, has not said whether he will vote to confirm Tanden. He dodged a question in an interview on CNN on Friday about whether he supports her confirmation.

Many of Tanden’s supporters blasted Manchin and Republicans following his statement, with some complaining that she was the victim of sexism.

Former Arizona Sen. Jeff Flake, a Republican who was highly critical of Trump, said on Saturday that Tanden should be confirmed. He warned Republicans that they one day will be back in power and want to confirm Cabinet and Cabinet-level nominees.

But at CAP, Tanden mounted lobbying campaigns to block Trump’s cabinet picks from being confirmed.

She tweeted on Feb. 8, 2017, that CAP was “proud to fight” against Jeff Sessions, who Trump picked for attorney general.

On Jan. 18, 2017, Tanden wrote that CAP was “fighting hard against” DeVos, who would lead the Department of Education.

CAP signed a letter to the Senate Health Education Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee with 37 other progressive groups expressing “strong concerns” with DeVos’s nomination.

On Jan. 6, 2017, CAP published a column from one of its senior fellows opposing Tillerson’s nomination to lead the State Department.

“The next U.S. secretary of state must, as Secretary John Kerry has, protect U.S. foreign policy and security interests and demonstrate a track record of personal and diplomatic credibility,” wrote Cathleen Kelly, a CAP senior fellow.

“President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee for the job, former ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson, does not meet those qualifications.”

On Jan. 18, 2017, CAP fellow Colin McArthur called for an investigation into whether Steven Mnuchin committed “any illegalities” when he ran OneWest Bank.

Tanden and CAP’s efforts were futile as all of the Trump nominees were confirmed.

CAP did not respond to a request for comment.

All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact licensing@dailycallernewsfoundation.org.

PREMIUM ARTICLE: Subscribe To Keep Reading

Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!

Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!

Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!

Sign Up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
Sign up

By subscribing you agree to our Terms of Use

You're signed up!
BENEFITS READERS PASS PATRIOTS FOUNDERS
Daily and Breaking Newsletters
Daily Caller Shows
Ad Free Experience
Exclusive Articles
Custom Newsletters
Editor Daily Rundown
Behind The Scenes Coverage
Award Winning Documentaries
Patriot War Room
Patriot Live Chat
Exclusive Events
Gold Membership Card
Tucker Mug

What does Founders Club include?

Tucker Mug and Membership Card
Founders

Readers,

Instead of sucking up to the political and corporate powers that dominate America, The Daily Caller is fighting for you — our readers. We humbly ask you to consider joining us in this fight.

Now that millions of readers are rejecting the increasingly biased and even corrupt corporate media and joining us daily, there are powerful forces lined up to stop us: the old guard of the news media hopes to marginalize us; the big corporate ad agencies want to deprive us of revenue and put us out of business; senators threaten to have our reporters arrested for asking simple questions; the big tech platforms want to limit our ability to communicate with you; and the political party establishments feel threatened by our independence.

We don't complain -- we can't stand complainers -- but we do call it how we see it. We have a fight on our hands, and it's intense. We need your help to smash through the big tech, big media and big government blockade.

We're the insurgent outsiders for a reason: our deep-dive investigations hold the powerful to account. Our original videos undermine their narratives on a daily basis. Even our insistence on having fun infuriates them -- because we won’t bend the knee to political correctness.

One reason we stand apart is because we are not afraid to say we love America. We love her with every fiber of our being, and we think she's worth saving from today’s craziness.

Help us save her.

A second reason we stand out is the sheer number of honest responsible reporters we have helped train. We have trained so many solid reporters that they now hold prominent positions at publications across the political spectrum. Hear a rare reasonable voice at a place like CNN? There’s a good chance they were trained at Daily Caller. Same goes for the numerous Daily Caller alumni dominating the news coverage at outlets such as Fox News, Newsmax, Daily Wire and many others.

Simply put, America needs solid reporters fighting to tell the truth or we will never have honest elections or a fair system. We are working tirelessly to make that happen and we are making a difference.

Since 2010, The Daily Caller has grown immensely. We're in the halls of Congress. We're in the Oval Office. And we're in up to 20 million homes every single month. That's 20 million Americans like you who are impossible to ignore.

We can overcome the forces lined up against all of us. This is an important mission but we can’t do it unless you — the everyday Americans forgotten by the establishment — have our back.

Please consider becoming a Daily Caller Patriot today, and help us keep doing work that holds politicians, corporations and other leaders accountable. Help us thumb our noses at political correctness. Help us train a new generation of news reporters who will actually tell the truth. And help us remind Americans everywhere that there are millions of us who remain clear-eyed about our country's greatness.

In return for membership, Daily Caller Patriots will be able to read The Daily Caller without any of the ads that we have long used to support our mission. We know the ads drive you crazy. They drive us crazy too. But we need revenue to keep the fight going. If you join us, we will cut out the ads for you and put every Lincoln-headed cent we earn into amplifying our voice, training even more solid reporters, and giving you the ad-free experience and lightning fast website you deserve.

Patriots will also be eligible for Patriots Only content, newsletters, chats and live events with our reporters and editors. It's simple: welcome us into your lives, and we'll welcome you into ours.

We can save America together.

Become a Daily Caller Patriot today.

Signature

Neil Patel