Senate begins confirming Biden cabinet nominations

[Alli]

Antony Blinken is confirmed 78-22 as Biden's Secretary of State.

Every time they say his name I hear “and Abe Lincoln.” It’s enough to drive me to drink!

 

[lizkat]

Senate JC hearing Biden's nomination for Secretary of Transportation today.
https://www.twitter.com/i/web/status/1352398682591809538/

The Senate confirmed Pete Buttigieg as Secretary of Transportation today, 86-13.

Pete Buttigieg Is Confirmed as Biden’s Transportation Secretary (Published 2021)

Mr. Buttigieg, 39, became the first openly gay cabinet secretary to have been approved by the Senate and the youngest member of the president’s cabinet.

www.nytimes.com

Mr. Buttigieg now faces a challenge. He will take over an agency that employs 55,000 people and controls around $87 billion in transportation funding at a time when the country’s modes of public transportation are reeling from the pandemic. As Mr. Biden’s senior official on transportation, he will most likely play a key role in shepherding any attempt the administration makes to get its $2 trillion infrastructure plan through Congress.

At his confirmation hearing last month, Mr. Buttigieg said there was a “generational opportunity” to transform infrastructure. He also pledged to work with the nation’s state, local and tribal leaders, and said he would try to mitigate the effect that transportation policies had historically had on poor and minority communities.