The Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Wednesday voted to advance the embattled nomination of Eric Garcetti to be ambassador to India.
The vote was 13-8, primarily along party lines. Two Republicans Sens. Todd Young of Indiana and Bill Hagerty of Tennessee voted with Democrats to support the nominee.
The next step is for Garcetti to get a vote on the floor of the US Senate. It still is not clear where the votes stand, but the fact he has two Republican votes in committee indicates he has some wiggle room on the floor to lose a handful of Democratic votes and still win the job.
Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, a New York Democrat, told CNN on Thursday that she will back Garcetti, a sign his nomination is building momentum.
A key holdout on the nomination, Gillibrand said she is confident in the review by the Foreign Relations Committee. Some other senators are still weighing the nomination, including Sen. Elizabeth Warren, a Massachusetts Democrat who told CNN she has yet to make up her mind.
A floor vote has yet to be scheduled. Timing is fluid due to several absences.
Garcetti cleared the same committee hurdle last Congress, but that was before he faced headwinds over a controversy from when he was mayor of Los Angeles.
CNN reported last year concerns over the nomination centered around a former employee in Garcetti’s mayoral office who has accused him of ignoring alleged sexual harassment and bullying by one of his former senior aides. Garcetti has repeatedly denied the allegations that he ignored the alleged harassment.
Naomi Seligman, a former Garcetti aide who’s accused the former Los Angeles mayor of ignoring credible sexual assault accusations during his time in office, blasted Wednesday’s vote.
“Today’s vote, on International Women’s Day no less, shows a real disconnect between the rhetoric we hear from elected leaders who claim to support victims of workplace sexual harassment and the pass they give to party loyalists in the next breath. It’s disheartening to say the least,” Seligman said in a statement, calling the former mayor “unfit to represent our country.”
This story has been updated with additional developments.