Schumer stalls Trumps DOJ nominees over Qatar palace in the sky jet gift

WASHINGTON — Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) has stalled Justice Department nominees from receiving final confirmation until President Trump’s administration comes clean about Qatar’s royal family offering a $400 million jumbo jet to replace Air Force One.Schumer announced the move in a Senate floor speech Tuesday, slamming the president for celebrating the “palace in the sky” gift as “so corrupt that even [Russian President Vladimir] Putin would give a double-take.”A hold will only delay — but not block — the nominees from confirmation, with a simple majority vote of GOP senators able to overcome it.At least three are already on the calendar, Schumer’s office said.The Democratic leader demanded that the Justice Department’s Foreign Agent Registration Act (FARA) unit give him details about how Qatar may be working on “deals” to benefit Trump, his family or their business interests.“How is this gift not naked corruption?” the New York senator added, referencing multi-billion dollar deals for the Trump Organization to build a golf course in Qatar and a hotel and residential skyscraper in Dubai.Attorney General Pam Bondi signed off on the Qatari jet and said it was “legally permissible,” ABC News reported — but Schumer expects her to testify before Congress on whether the transfer violates the Constitution’s Emoluments Clause.Schumer also expressed concern about the national security implications — and potential further cost to US taxpayers — about accepting the plane from the foreign nation, which Trump had called “a funder of terrorism at a very high level” during his first term in 2017.But the president cheered reports from ABC News and other outlets disclosing the Boeing 747-8 jet, calling it “a GIFT, FREE OF CHARGE”“So the fact that the Defense Department is getting a GIFT, FREE OF CHARGE, of a 747 aircraft to replace the 40 year old Air Force One, temporarily, in a very public and transparent transa...