What’s the hurry on Trump’s Cabinet picks?

Donald Trump wants a Cabinet full of billionaires and ideologues. However misguided, that’s his prerogative as president-elect.

But talk about the need for “extreme vetting.”

Instead, Trump’s team and Senate Republican leaders intend to rush his nominees through confirmation hearings this week without enough time for questioning in some cases and without full financial disclosures in others.

The hearings started Tuesday with one of the most controversial nominees, Sen. Jeff Sessions of Alabama for attorney general, the nation’s top law enforcement official.

Sessions was rejected for a federal judgeship 30 years ago over racially insensitive comments and has since compiled a hard-line record in the Senate. There are very good reasons why advocacy groups strongly oppose his nomination and why more than 1,100 law professors sent a letter to Congress declaring that Sessions will not promote justice and equality.

Sessions, however, went to great lengths Tuesday to dispel the notion that he would attempt to turn back the clock on civil rights and the right to vote.

“I abhor the (Klu Klux) Klan and what it represents, and its hateful ideology,” Sessions said.

“I deeply understand the history of civil rights and the horrendous impact that relentless and systemic discrimination and the denial of voting rights has had on our African-American brothers and sisters.”

Sessions also said he recuse himself from investigations into Hillary Clinton.

Republicans are jamming the schedule with hearings for two more nominees on Wednesday, when attention will be focused on Trump’s first official press conference in almost six months. They’re expected to include Elaine Chao at Transportation and Rex Tillerson at the State Department.

Hearings for as many as four more nominees are on tap for Thursday: Ben Carson at Housing and Urban Development, James Mattis at Defense, Mike Pompeo at the Central Intelligence Agency and Wilbur Ross at Commerce.

There will be no shortage of topics, not the least of which is Trump’s friendliness to Russia despite its interference in the presidential election.

But the hearings are proceeding despite the independent Office of Government Ethics’ warning last week that it had not completed several reviews – and that it would be the first time in the office’s four decades that nominees would get hearings without them.

The reviews are more complicated and time-consuming because many nominees have extensive business holdings and have not served in government before, and it’s possible they could uncover disqualifying conflicts.

Predictably, top Senate Republican Mitch McConnell of Kentucky dismisses these legitimate concerns about the Senate’s ability to fulfill its constitutional duty to advise and consent on Cabinet picks as mere partisan politics. He told Democrats to “grow up” and justifies the quick schedule by noting that seven of President Barack Obama’s Cabinet nominees were confirmed on his inauguration day in 2009. But McConnell conveniently ignores that he demanded the ethics reviews of Obama nominees be completed before hearings.

McConnell did say that no nominee will get an up-or-down vote until the ethics office and FBI have completed their background checks. But that bare minimum shouldn’t be the standard. Instead, this is looking like an ethics-challenged administration from the start, with Trump setting a terrible example. He claimed again Monday that separating his business empire from the presidency will be “very simple, very easy.”

It’s not.

While Trump isn’t covered by federal ethics laws, his Cabinet picks are. The least he can do is make sure they don’t break the law and are worthy of the public’s trust.

This story was originally published January 10, 2017 at 11:29 AM with the headline "What’s the hurry on Trump’s Cabinet picks?."