White House formally withdraws Bounds nomination after McConnell cancels vote

The White House formally withdrew President Trump’s controversial circuit court nomination for Ryan Bounds on Tuesday, almost a week after Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) announced that his nomination would not make it to a vote due to lack of support.

A decades-old article by Bounds calling diversity training a “pestilence” was part of what sank his nomination in the Senate.

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“The nomination will be withdrawn,” McConnell said last week in announcing his decision to cancel the vote.

Senators argued that Bounds had concealed the writings, which Bounds penned while he was a student, and every Democratic senator was expected to vote against him.

His nomination was ultimately sunk by Sens. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and Tim Scott (R-S.C.), who sources said were planning to vote against Bounds as well.

“Sen. Scott needed more time to talk to people who knew him and that’s not available. Sen. Scott said he couldn’t vote for him today if the vote was now. I support him in that decision,” Rubio told reporters.

Bounds had apologized for the writings during his hearing in May, calling the rhetoric he used “overheated.”

“I share the concerns of many that the rhetoric I used in debating campus politics back in the early ’90s on Stanford’s campus was often overheated, overbroad,” he said.

Bounds, who was nominated to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, would have been Trump’s 24th appeals court nominee approved by the Senate had his nomination succeeded.