Senate confirms Biden Commerce secretary pick Gina Raimondo

The Senate confirmed Gina Raimondo as Commerce secretary on Tuesday in an 84-15 vote despite early GOP efforts to block her nomination.

Raimondo, who has served as governor of Rhode Island since 2015, faced pushback as a nominee from Republicans over her comments about keeping Chinese telecom giant Huawei on the Commerce Department’s “entity list.”

Huawei was placed on the entity list, which effectively blacklists the company, by the Trump administration over concerns it posed an espionage threat due to ties to the Chinese government.

During her confirmation hearing, Raimondo said she would review the policy and consult with lawmakers, allies and industry experts, but she did not specifically commit to keeping the company on the list.

The potential decision to remove Huawei from the blacklist, though, would not solely be up to Raimondo as secretary, as Don Morrissey, Huawei’s head of congressional, state and local government affairs, told The Hill last week.