Reid pushes to get aide on nuclear panel

Suzanne Struglinski

Tuesday, June 15, 2004 | 11:11 a.m.

WASHINGTON -- Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., is raising the stakes in his fight to get one of his aides onto the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

Reid now promises to block all the administration's nominees from going through the Senate until Greg Jaczko, a physicist on Reid's staff, gets a confirmation hearing for one of the two vacant seats on the commission.

Reid said he expanded the hold since "nothing was happening."

The deal he reached with the White House was only for the nomination, Reid said, so now he is working toward the confirmation.

The hold will not apply to judicial or military nominees, but will affect President Bush's appointments of Steve Johnson to be deputy administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency and Ben Grumbles to be the agency's assistant administrator for water, as well as about three dozen other nominees, according to Reid's office.

Reid announced last month that he would block any Environment and Public Works Committee business from moving forward until Jaczko gets his hearing.

The White House nominated Jaczko in February, based on a deal made with Reid to lift his hold on Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Mike Leavitt. Reid had placed the hold on Leavitt and other nominees after the White House rejected Jaczko's nomination recommendation but offered no explanation.

Jaczko, who now handles appropriations matters for the senator, was involved with Reid's fight against the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste storage project, planned for 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas. The commission will ultimately decide if the project can move forward.

Jaczko says he can objectively evaluate the site, but the nuclear energy industry would rather see someone less obviously anti-Yucca serve on the five-member commission.

The White House has not made another nomination to fill the other vacant seat. Its original nominee, Navy Vice Adm. John J. Grossenbacher, withdrew his nomination in February.

The plan is still to consider both nominees together, a Republican aide to the Environment and Public Works Committee said, noting that nothing has changed on the committee's schedule.

But Reid says the White House has not even offered a nominee yet for the two to be questioned at once.

"I'm not going to wait for their delay, that's their problem, not mine," Reid said.