President Joe Biden withdrew his nomination from Neera Tanden to head the Office of Management and Budget after the senators made it clear that his path to confirmation was unlikely.
“I accepted Neera Tanden’s request to remove his name from the nomination for Director of the Office of Management and Budget,” Biden said in a statement late on Tuesday. “I have the utmost respect for her record of achievements, her experience and her advice, and I look forward to having her in a role in my administration.”
Tanden was a controversial choice for Biden, and it was clear from the start that she would have trouble getting confirmed in a Senate with little Democratic control.
The head of the Center for American Progress, Tanden has been a close advisor to Hillary Clinton and a constant presence in political struggles for the past five years, including within the Democratic Party. This often leaked to Twitter, where she frequently attacked Republican senators who would now have to vote for her nomination.
But she faced problems even among Democrats. The Senate Budget Committee is now chaired by Senator Bernie Sanders, with whom Tanden clashed during the 2020 presidential primaries after his run-off against Clinton in 2016. Sanders had didn’t make it clear how he would end up voting for Tanden. Senator Joe Manchin, a fickle Democratic vote, announced his opposition to Tanden last month, which meant that at least one Republican would have to support his nomination for the Senate to succeed in a 50-50 Senate split. Hearings on his nomination in the Senate were postponed last week, making the withdrawal seem inevitable.
“I appreciate how hard you and your team at the White House worked to earn my confirmation,” wrote Tanden in a letter to Biden released by the White House on Tuesday. “Unfortunately, it now seems clear that there is no way forward for confirmation and I don’t want continued consideration of my appointment to be a distraction from his other priorities.”