A tradition where senators can approve or block US circuit and district court and US attorney nominees from their home states.
The Smashing Machine
Since 1917, the chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee has sent a blue “slip” of paper to the senators representing the home state of certain judicial nominees. The slip asks senators to indicate whether they approve or oppose a nominee. If one or both senators oppose a district court or US attorney nominee, the nomination process will not continue. Similarly, if a senator does not return a blue slip, the nomination is effectively paused. Circuit court nominees do not need this approval because these courts have jurisdiction over multiple states, but senators are still given blue slips for nominees to gauge their support.
Blue slips allow senators to exercise control over how federal laws are prosecuted and enforced in their home state, regardless of party affiliation. Blue slips are not a written part of the Judiciary Committee’s nor the Senate’s rules. It is one of many informal traditions that the Senate upholds.
Sentimental Value
The power of blue slips has waxed and waned in the century since the practice began. Because it is not a formal rule, the practice can be altered at any time by the Senate Judiciary Committee’s chair. The most recent change was instituted by current Chair Chuck Grassley (R-IA). In 2017, Grassley ended the requirement for circuit court nominees to secure positive blue slips from their home-state senators. He argued that these courts’ multi-state jurisdictions make a nominee’s home-state senators’ approval less relevant.
Various Judiciary Committee chairs have had varying views on blue slips over time, routinely shrinking and expanding this power. Negative blue slips are most often used by minority party senators as a check against an opposition party president’s power. The status of a nominee’s blue slips is rarely made public, and it is often a formality negotiated during private consultation with the Executive Branch before the blue slips are officially delivered.
One Battle After Another
President Trump’s second term has seen the most withdrawn nominees in the first year of any administration this century, partially due to Democrats utilizing the blue slip tradition to oppose nominees. The most high-profile use of blue slips is the failed nomination of Alina Habba to be US Attorney for the District of New Jersey. Habba represented Trump in several personal legal matters. She was appointed to the role in an acting capacity in March 2025, but Senators Andy Kim (D-NJ) and Cory Booker (D-NJ) opposed her nomination.
Using their blue slip privilege, the New Jersey senators blocked Habba’s nomination, and she was eventually required to leave her acting role after a legal battle. This led President Trump to call for blue slips to be eliminated for US attorney nominations, claiming the practice was unconstitutional. Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) and other Republican senators pushed back, citing their use of blue slips to block former President Joe Biden’s judicial nominees.
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