If there’s ever been a textbook case of GOP doublespeak, it’s congressional Republicans’ treatment of Neera Tanden, President Biden’s nominee to lead the Office of Management and Budget (OMB). By wringing their hands over her supposedly mean tweets, congressional Republicans have attempted to don the mantle of civility while remaining stooges to Donald Trump, the most boorish president in history, on Twitter and off.

President Biden on Wednesday nominated a former postal union lawyer, a vote-by-mail advocate, and a former deputy postmaster general to sit on the Postal Services' Board of Governors.

Why it matters: The nominations, which require Senate confirmation, come as some Democrats call for Postmaster General Louis DeJoy's ouster and others push for Biden to nominate board members to name a new postmaster general.

If Biden's nominees are accepted, Democrats would hold a majority on the board, per the Washington Post, which first reported this story.

As President Joe Biden works to overhaul U.S. health care policy, few challenges will loom larger for his health secretary than restoring access to family planning while parrying legal challenges to abortion proliferating across the country.

Physicians, clinics and women's health advocates are looking to Xavier Becerra, Biden's nominee to run the Department of Health and Human Services, to help swiftly unwind Trump-era funding cuts and rules that have decimated the nation's network of reproductive health providers over the past four years.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.) will vote to confirm Merrick Garland as attorney general for the Biden administration, Politico reported on Tuesday.

In 2016, McConnell blocked Senate hearings for Garland when former President Obama nominated him to replace deceased justice Antonin Scalia on the Supreme Court. The decision was the “most consequential thing I’ve ever done,” McConnell later commented. The Senate approved three conservative justices during the Trump administration.

President Joe Biden’s nominee for U.S. attorney general, Merrick Garland, said during the first day of his confirmation hearing on Monday that the attacks on federal courthouses in the Pacific Northwest may not qualify as domestic terrorism because the attacks happen at night when the court is closed.

“Let me ask you about assaults on federal property in places other than Washington, D.C. Portland for instance, Seattle,” Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) said. “Do you regard assaults on federal courthouses or other federal property as acts of domestic extremism, domestic terrorism?

For Merrick Garland, a well-regarded lawyer and federal judge — and onetime Supreme Court nominee — there was a critical condition under which he’d accept the nomination of attorney general under President Biden.

“Merrick’s acceptance comment was, ‘President-elect Biden has guaranteed me independence,’” Earl Steinberg, a childhood friend of Garland, recalled from Biden and Garland’s Jan. 7 nomination announcement. “Then he choked up a little bit and said, ‘or I would not have accepted the nomination.’ That is classic Merrick.”

President Joe Biden’s attorney general nominee, Merrick Garland, vowed on Monday to protect the integrity of the Justice Department from partisan influence, in an effort to restore confidence after President Donald Trump repeatedly sought to bend the department to his will. Trump, a Republican who lost to Biden in November, for years attacked Justice Department investigations of his 2016 campaign and Russian election interference as a “witch hunt” or a “hoax.”

President Biden pledged to make his Cabinet the most diverse in U.S. history, better representing the makeup of the country.

An NPR analysis of the past three administrations' initial Cabinets shows that so far, he has kept his word, with an inner circle that outdoes his two most recent predecessors in matters of representation of race and gender.

One week into the new administration, President Biden has four confirmed cabinet members and the Senate could take action on others by the end of this week.

With Democrats now holding the majority in the Senate, they hope to quickly confirm the rest of President Biden's cabinet picks while juggling other top priorities.

"The Senate will deal with three things simultaneously, nominations - we are working to confirm more nominees this week, a fair impeachment trial, and delivering emergency COVID relief," Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) told reporters Tuesday.

The Senate confirmed Antony Blinken to be President Biden’s Secretary of State, the fourth in the line of succession to the presidency, who Biden has tasked with leading the effort to bring the U.S. back to the global stage and rebuild alliances that suffered under the Trump administration.

The Senate voted 78-22 for Blinken’s confirmation, making him the 71st secretary of State and the fourth member of Biden’s Cabinet to be confirmed.