Senate confirmation of cabinet appointments: Congress-centered, presidency-centered, and nominee-centered explanations

• We model the outcomes of presidential cabinet nominations in the Senate.
• Traditional measures of presidential influence in Congress have little effect on nomination deliberations.
• Characteristics of the nominee, including the nominee's qualifications, allegations of misconduct by the nominee, and policy positions of the nominee significantly impact confirmation by the Senate.

Recent presidents find greater proportions of their executive nominations encountering substantial opposition in the Senate. What accounts for failed nominations to senior-level executive positions? We address this question by examining 297 cabinet and other senior-level nominations between 1969 and 2012, testing multivariate models of the effects of the partisan and ideological composition of the Senate, the president's public approval and electoral mandate, and characteristics of the nominee. The analysis demonstrates that allegations of illegal or unethical behavior by the nominee and concerns over policy preferences best explain the Senate's response to executive nominations. It is clear that, unlike legislative outcomes, confirmation outcomes are the products of nominee-centered factors with presidency-centered factors and Congress-centered factors having little impact on Senate decisions.