Summary:

Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii) is expanding his holds on President Trump’s nominees to include an additional 50 names — along with a batch of bipartisan foreign affairs bills, Axios has learned.

Why it matters:

That brings the total number of Trump nominees Schatz has now ground to a halt to more than 300, intensifying his protest of what he calls the White House’s “lawlessness.”

• The fresh holds include former Rep. Anthony D’Esposito (R-N.Y.), Trump’s pick to be Labor Department inspector general, and Scott Kupor, tapped to lead the Office of Personnel Management.
• The new holds span nominees at more than a dozen Trump administration agencies and departments. Schatz has already placed holds on all State Department nominees.
• Schatz also is blocking nine bipartisan bills that recently cleared the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in protest of what he characterized as the committee’s lax oversight of the Trump administration.