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Some members have said they will be protesting in Washington and in their districts instead.

Responding to a question from CNN's Michelle Kosinski, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said Tuesday that he believed the boycotts were "a reflection of the division in the country right now" and said members of Congress are "freer to express their opinion" than administration officials.

Asked if members of the Obama administration would boycott the inauguration if they could, Earnest said he "wouldn't speculate on what people around here would say."

Here's a list of Democrats who have publicly said they won't be at Friday's ceremony:

The civil rights icon declared last week that he would boycott the event because he doesn't see Trump as a "legitimate" president in light of Russian interference.

"I thought long and hard about attending the Inauguration because I value our democracy and respect the office of the presidency, regardless of party. However, the disparaging remarks the President-elect has made about many groups, including women, Mexicans, and Muslims, are deeply contrary to my values. As a result, I will not be attending the Inauguration," Roybal-Allard said in a statement Sunday.

"I will not celebrate a man who preaches a politics of division and hate. I won't be attending Donald Trump's inauguration," Ellison, who is running for chairman of the Democratic National Committee, tweeted Monday.

"'All talk, no action.' I stand with @repjohnlewis and I will not be attending the inauguration," Takano tweeted Saturday.

"I will NOT attend the inauguration of @realDonaldTrump. When you insult @repjohnlewis, you insult America."

He announced his decision on CNN's "New Day" and then issued a statement: "The rhetoric and actions of Donald Trump have been so far beyond the pale -- so disturbing and disheartening -- and his continued failure to address his conflicts of interest, to adequately divest or even to fully disclose his financial dealings, or to sufficiently separate himself from the ethical misconduct that legal experts on both side of the aisle have identified have been so offensive I cannot in good conscience participate in this honored and revered democratic tradition of the peaceful transfer of power."

"I will not be attending the inauguration of Donald Trump as our next president," the Congressional Progressive Caucus co-chair said Friday on the House floor. "My absence is not motivated by disrespect for the office or motivated by disrespect for the government that we have in this great democracy, but as an individual act, yes, of defiance at the disrespect shown to millions and millions of Americans by this incoming administration, and the actions we are taking in this Congress."

The office of Conyers, the dean of the United House of Representatives, confirmed to CNN he won't be attending the inauguration.

"It is with a heavy heart and deep personal conviction that I have decided not to attend the #TrumpInauguration on January 20, 2017," the California lawmaker tweeted Friday.

Velazquez tweeted Friday that she will be participating in a women's march protesting policies that activists say are harmful to American women.

"I will not be attending inauguration of @realDonaldTrump but WILL participate in the @womensmarch on January 21st," she tweeted.

Lee said she'll spend the day "preparing for resistance."

"Donald Trump has proven that his administration will normalize the most extreme fringes of the Republican Party. On Inauguration Day, I will not be celebrating. I will be organizing and preparing for resistance," she said Thursday in a statement.

"I will not attend the #inauguration2017 next week- cannot celebrate the inauguration of a man who has no regard for my constituents. #Bronx," he tweeted Thursday.

"After much thought, I have decided to #StandWithJohnLewis and not attend the inauguration," Chu tweeted this weekend.

"I cannot go to (the) inauguration of a man who's going to appoint people to the Supreme Court and turn back the clock on women and turn back the clock on immigrants and the safety and freedom that we fought for them," Gutierrez said last month on CNN's "New Day."

"I have decided that instead of attending the inaugural ceremonies in Washington this month, I'll spend time in California with my constituents making a positive difference in our community," he wrote on Facebook Tuesday. "From helping to build homes for local families to pitching in on cleaning up flood debris to welcoming new US citizens at a naturalization ceremony --- it will be an action-packed couple of days. Stay tuned here for more details."

"There is unprecedented concern by my constituents about the many threats posed by a Trump administration seeking to implement the President-elect's policies on health, environment, nuclear weapons and immigration, to name but a few," he said on Facebook.

"Many have given their lives and dedicated their lives to working to fulfill Dr. King's dream and make it a reality, and it is up to us to preserve his legacy and the legacy of President Barack Obama to ensure that we do not go back in time! President-elect Donald Trump is trying to take us back! And the people Trump is appointing-- Steve Bannon, Jeff Sessions -- are trying to take us back!

"That's why I am not attending the presidential inauguration. Donald Trump and the hate-filled rhetoric that plagued his election simply will continue in his administration. THIS is not Dr. King's Dream!" Espaillat issued the statement on his Facebook page.

.@realDonaldTrump: @repjohnlewis stands for best of everything in America. If anyone knows about action not words, it's him. #ImWithJohn

"After reading classified Russian hacking doc & @realDonaldTrump offensive tweets to @repjohnlewis I will not be attending the Inauguration."

"As I told @JoyAnnReid, I will not be attending #Inauguration. I will be at home in Cleveland. #IStandWithJohnLewis."

"I never ever contemplated attending the inauguration or any activities associated w/ @realDonaldTrump. I wouldn't waste my time."

"I do not intend to attend the inauguration of PE @realDonaldTrump. Instead, join me for an Interfaith Prayer Vigil."

"Skipping Inauguration.@RepJohnLewis a civil rights hero. Enormous responsibility to be POTUS.I respect the office, can't tolerate disrespect," he tweeted Monday.

"I wanted to let you know that I am not attending this Friday's inaugural ceremonies ... I will not be part of normalizing or legitimizing a man whose election may well have depended on the malicious foreign interference of Russia's leaders, a person who lies profusely and without apology, who mimics the disabilities of others, who insults anyone who dares disagree with him, who would demonize an entire spiritual tradition, and who has demonstrated again and again a profound disrespect for women," he tweeted.

"At MLK Day dinner in Portland, I announced that I would not attend Trump's inauguration," she tweeted.

"It's not my intent to protest the election results or to make a statement about policy. I will not be attending the inauguration because I believe the office of the President deserves our respect, and that respect must begin with the President-elect himself," the congressman said in a statement.

The lawmaker decided not to attend after conducting a Twitter poll on whether her constituents wanted her to attend.

"I #StandWithJohnLewis. I will not be attending the inauguration. Russian hacking must be investigated and I do not support the repeal of ACA," he said.

"We must stand against Trump's bigotries- birther conspiracies, attacks on (gold star) parents & civil rights heroes. I won't attend inauguration," he tweeted.

The former Congressional Black Caucus chairman called Trump divisive.

"Considering Mr. Trump's brand of division and insult, I believe it would be hurtful to my constituents for me to attend the inauguration," he tweeted.

"After serious consideration, I have decided that I will not stand with Donald Trump during his ceremonial inauguration," Crdenas said in a statement. "He has been consistent in his words and actions -- he has disrespected countless Americans -- women, civil rights leaders, Hispanics, people with disabilities, Muslims, gold star families, African Americans, POWs and more. I feel this decision best represents my family, constituents and country."

"I'm going to #StandWithJohnLewis. I won't attend the Inauguration on Friday," he tweeted.

" I will not be attending the Inauguration. Instead, I will be praying for our country and for our community with the people of my district," he tweeted.

"I accept the decision of the people. I respect it. But I will not celebrate it," Boyle added.

"I will not be attending the inauguration this Friday," he tweeted. "We are sending a message to Mr. Trump. Respect, like Pennsylvania Avenue, is a two-way street."

"The election of Mr. Trump lacks legitimacy due to Russian hacking, which Mr. Trump encouraged, the FBI's biased involvement, and other irregularities, and I cannot sanction the inauguration by attending the ceremony," McNerney said in a statement Tuesday. "However, because I support the peaceful transition of power and respect the office of the presidency, I will work with the new administration when possible to deliver for my district and move our country forward."

CNN's Caroline Kenny, Joe Sutton and Kevin Liptak contributed to this report.

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These Democrats aren't attending Trump's inauguration ...

A growing number of Democrats, Hollywood celebrities and some Republicans came to the defense of civil rights leader Rep. John Lewis amid fallout from Donald Trump's comments earlier on Saturday.

Trump said that Lewis, who has argued the president-elect won't be a legitimate leader, should focus more on fixing his Georgia district.

Lewis should spend more time on fixing and helping his district, which is in horrible shape and falling apart, Trump tweeted.

The response on Twitter was swift. GOP Sen. Ben Sassse of Nebraska tweeted that "John Lewis and his "talk" have changed the world."

Residents of Lewis' district in Atlanta, meanwhile, in response to a tweet from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, began to post pictures of their neighborhoods on Twitter -- many of which did not fit with Trump's characterization.

Lewis, a leader in the civil rights movement of the 1960s who was beaten by state troopers during the "Bloody Sunday" march from Selma to Montgomery in Alabama, says in an NBC's "Meet the Press" to air Sunday that he does not consider Trump a "legitimate president," and blamed the Russians for helping the Republican win the White House.

"You know, I believe in forgiveness. I believe in trying to work with people. It will be hard. It's going to be very difficult. I don't see this president-elect as a legitimate president," Lewis said.

Trump, in followup tweet Saturday, said Lewis should spend more time helping his "crime invested" district, instead of "falsely complaining about the election results."

"All talk, talk, talk -- no action or results. Sad." Trump concluded.

Lewsi has said he will skip next week's inauguration of Trump at the Capitol, joining several other Democrats who have decided to boycott the historic event.

"I think the Russians participated in helping this man get elected. And they helped destroy the candidacy of Hillary Clinton," Lewis said.

The Lewis-Trump fued escalted on the eve of Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

U.S. Intelligence agencies have said Russia meddled in the election to help Trump win. After spending weeks challenging that assessment, Trump finally accepted that the Russians were behind the election-year hacking of Democrats that roiled the White House race. However, he also emphasized that "there was absolutely no effect on the outcome of the election including the fact that there was no tampering whatsoever with voting machines."

Lewis explained his decision to stay away from the inauguration as "you cannot be at home with something that you feel that is wrong, is not right."

He said it will be the first inauguration he has missed in three decades, a time that includes Democrats and Republicans taking the oath of office.

Other Democratic lawmakers who have announced plans to skip the inauguration include Reps. Barbara Lee of California, Earl Blumenauer of Oregon, Katherine Clark of Massachusetts and Luis Gutierrez of Illinois. They cite an array of reasons, but have one at least one thing in common. All represent heavily Democratic districts.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Democrats, celebrities and Republicans defend Democratic Rep ...

Southern Democrats are members of the U.S. Democratic Party who reside in the American South.

In the 19th century, Southern Democrats comprised whites in the South who believed in Jeffersonian democracy. In the 1850s they defended slavery in the United States, and promoted its expansion into the West against northern Free Soil opposition. The United States presidential election of 1860 formalized the split, and brought war. After Reconstruction ended in the late 1870s they controlled all the Southern states and disenfranchised blacks (who were Republicans). The Solid South gave nearly all its electoral votes to Democrats in presidential elections. Republicans seldom were elected to office outside some Appalachian mountain districts and a few heavily German-American counties of Texas.[a]

The monopoly that the Democratic Party held over most of the South first showed major signs of breaking apart in 1948, when many Southern Democrats, dissatisfied with the policies of desegregation enacted during the administration of Democratic President Harry Truman, created the States Rights Democratic Party, which nominated South Carolina Governor Strom Thurmond for president and Mississippi Governor Fielding L. Wright for vice president. The Dixiecrats managed to win many Southern states, but collapsed as a party soon after the election. The Civil Rights Act of 1964, signed by President Lyndon B. Johnson, a Democrat from the Southern state of Texas, led many Southern Democrats to vote for Goldwater at the national level. In the ensuing years, the increasing conservatism of the Republican Party compared to the liberalism of the Democratic Party led many more conservative white Democrats in the South to vote Republican. Many continued to vote for Democrats at the state and local levels for years after. By the start of the 21st century, Republicans had gained a solid advantage over Democrats at all levels of politics in most Southern states.

Today, Southern Democrats largely consist of blacks living in urban areas of the region.[citation needed]

The title of Democrat has its beginnings in the South, going back to the founding of the Democratic-Republican Party in 1793 by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison. It held to small government principles and distrusted the national government. Foreign policy was a major issue. After being the dominant party in U.S. politics from 1800 to 1829, the Democratic-Republicans split into two factions by 1828: the federalist National Republicans, and the Democrats. The Democrats and Whigs were evenly balanced in the 1830s and 1840s. However, by the 1850s, the Whigs disintegrated. Other opposition parties emerged but the Democrats were dominant. Northern Democrats were in serious opposition to Southern Democrats on the issue of slavery; Northern Democrats, led by Stephen Douglas, believed in Popular Sovereigntyletting the people of the territories vote on slavery. The conservative Southern Democrats, reflecting the views of the late John C. Calhoun, insisted slavery was national.

The Democrats controlled the national government from 1852 until 1860, and Presidents Pierce and Buchanan were friendly to Southern interests. In the North, the newly formed anti-slavery Republican Party came to power, and dominated the electoral college. In the 1860 presidential election, the Republicans nominated Abraham Lincoln, but the divide among Democrats led to the nomination of two candidates: John C. Breckinridge of Kentucky represented Southern Democrats, and Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois represented Northern Democrats. Nevertheless, the Republicans had a majority of the electoral vote regardless of how the opposition split or joined together and Abraham Lincoln was elected.

After the election of Abraham Lincoln, Southern Democrats led the charge to secede from the Union and form the Confederate States of America. The Congress was dominated by Republicans, save for Andrew Johnson of Tennessee, the only senator from a state in rebellion to reject secession. The Border States of Kentucky, Maryland, and Missouri were torn by political turmoil. Kentucky and Missouri were both governed by pro-secessionist Southern Democratic Governors who vehemently rejected Lincoln's call for 75,000 troops. Kentucky and Missouri both held secession conventions and seceded while under Federal occupation. Southern Democrats in Maryland faced a Unionist Governor Thomas Holliday Hicks and the Union Army. Armed with the suspension of habeas corpus and Union troops, Governor Hicks was able to stop Maryland's secession movement. Maryland was the only state south of the MasonDixon line whose governor affirmed Lincolns call for 75,000 troops.

After secession, the Democratic vote in the North split between the War Democrats and the Peace Democrats or Copperheads. The War Democrats voted for Lincoln in the 1864 election, and he had oneAndrew Johnsonon his ticket. In the South during Reconstruction the white Republican element, called Scalawags became smaller and smaller as more and more joined the Democrats. In the North most War Democrats returned to the Democracy, and when the Panic of 1873 hit, the GOP was blamed and the Democrats gained control of the House of Representatives in 1874. The Democrats emphasized that since Jefferson and Jackson they had been the party of states rights, which added to their appeal in the white South.

At the beginning of the 20th century the Democrats, led by the dominant Southern wing, had a strong representation in Congress. They won both houses in 1912 and elected Woodrow Wilson, a New Jersey academic with deep Southern roots and a strong base among the Southern middle class. The GOP regained Congress in 1918.

From 1921 until 1930, the Democrats, despite universal dominance in most of the South, were relegated to second place status in national politics, controlling no branch of the federal government. In 1928 several Southern states dallied with voting Republican in supporting Herbert Hoover over Al Smith, but the behavior was short lived as the Stock Market Crash of 1929 returned Republicans to disfavor throughout the South. Nationally, Republicans lost Congress in 1930 and the White House in 1932 by huge margins. By this time, too, the Democratic Party leadership began to change its tone somewhat on racial politics. With the Great Depression gripping the nation, and with the lives of most Americans disrupted, the assisting of African-Americans in American society was seen as necessary by the new government.

During the 1930s, as the New Deal began to move Democrats as a whole to the left in economic policy, Southern Democrats were mostly supportive, although by the late 1930s there was a growing conservative faction. Both factions supported Roosevelts foreign policies. By 1948 the protection of segregation led Democrats in the Deep South to reject Truman and run a third party ticket of Dixiecrats in the 1948 election. After 1964, Southern Democrats lost major battles during the Civil Rights Movement. Federal laws ended segregation and restrictions on black voters.

After World War II, during the Civil Rights Movement, Democrats in the South initially still voted loyally with their party. After the signing of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the old argument that all whites had to stick together to prevent civil rights legislation lost its force because the legislation had now been passed. More and more whites began to vote Republican, especially in the suburbs and growing cities. Newcomers from the North were mostly Republican; they were now joined by conservatives and wealthy Southern whites, while liberal whites and poor whites, especially in rural areas, remained with the Democratic Party.[1]

The New Deal program of Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR) generally united the party factions for over three decades, since Southerners, like Northern urban populations, were hit particularly hard and generally benefited from the massive governmental relief program. FDR was adept at holding white Southerners in the coalition[2] while simultaneously beginning the erosion of Black voters away from their then-characteristic Republican preferences. The Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s catalyzed the end of this Democratic Party coalition of interests by magnetizing Black voters to the Democratic label and simultaneously ending White control of the Democratic Party apparatus.[3] A series of court decisions, rendering primary elections as public instead of private events administered by the parties, essentially freed the Southern region to change more toward the two-party behavior of most of the rest of the nation.

In the presidential elections of 1952 and 1956 Republican nominee Dwight David Eisenhower, a popular World War II general, won several Southern states, thus breaking some white Southerners away from their Democratic Party pattern. The passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was a significant event in converting the Deep South to the Republican Party; in that year most Senatorial Republicans supported the Act (most of the opposition came from Southern Democrats), but the Republican Party nominated for the Presidency Arizona Senator Barry Goldwater, who had opposed it. From the end of the Civil War to 1960 Democrats had solid control over the southern states in presidential elections, hence the term Solid South to describe the states Democratic preference. After the passage of this Act, however, their willingness to support Republicans on a presidential level increased demonstrably. Goldwater won many of the Solid South states over Democratic candidate Lyndon Johnson, himself a Texan, and with many this Republican support continued and seeped down the ballot to congressional, state, and ultimately local levels. A further significant item of legislation was the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which targeted for preclearance by the U.S. Department of Justice any election-law change in areas where African-American voting participation was lower than the norm (most but not all of these areas were in the South); the effect of the Voting Rights Act on southern elections was profound, including the by-product that some White Southerners perceived it as meddling while Black voters universally appreciated it. The trend toward acceptance of Republican identification among Southern White voters was bolstered in the next two elections by Richard Nixon.

Denouncing the forced busing policy that was used to enforce school desegregation,[4]Richard Nixon courted populist conservative Southern whites with what is called the Southern Strategy, though his speechwriter Jeffrey Hart claimed that his campaign rhetoric was actually a Border State Strategy and accused the press of being very lazy when they called it a "Southern Strategy".[5] In the 1971 Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education ruling, the power of the federal government to enforce forced busing was strengthened when the Supreme Court ruled that the federal courts had the discretion to include busing as a desegregation tool to achieve racial balance. Some southern Democrats became Republicans at the national level, while remaining with their old party in state and local politics throughout the 1970s and 1980s. Of the known Dixiecrats, only three switched parties becoming Republicans: Strom Thurmond, Jesse Helms and Mills E. Godwin, Jr. In the 1974 Milliken v. Bradley decision, however, the ability to use forced busing as a political tactic was greatly diminished when the U.S. Supreme Court placed an important limitation on Swann and ruled that students could only be bused across district lines if evidence of de jure segregation across multiple school districts existed.

In 1976, former Georgia governor Jimmy Carter won every Southern state except Oklahoma and Virginia in his successful campaign to win the Presidency as a Democrat, but his support among White voters in the South evaporated amid their disappointment that he was not the yearned-for reincarnation of Democratic conservatism besides ongoing economic problems. In 1980 Republican presidential nominee Ronald Reagan won overwhelmingly in most of the South.[b]

In 1980, the Southern Strategy would see fruition when Ronald Reagan announced that he supported states rights and that welfare abuse justified the need for it.[6]Lee Atwater, who served Reagan's chief strategist in the Southern states, claimed that by 1968, a vast majority of southern whites had learned to accept that racial slurs like "nigger" were very offensive and that mentioning "states rights" and reasons for its justification had now become the best way to appeal to southern white voters.[7] Later Republican candidates were accused of using racial appeals similar to Reagan[citation needed]. For example, George H.W. Bush faced accusations of racism with the Willie Horton ads[citation needed], while Newt Gingrich faced similar criticism in 2012 by calling Barack Obama a food-stamp president.[citation needed]

The South became fertile ground for the GOP, which conversely was becoming more conservative as the Democrats were becoming more liberal[citation needed]. Democratic incumbents, however, still held sway over voters in many states, especially in Deep South. Although Republicans won most presidential elections in Southern states starting in 1964, Democrats controlled nearly every Southern state legislature until the mid-1990s and had a moderate (although not huge) amount of members in state legislatures until 2010. In fact, until 2002, Democrats still had much control over Southern politics. It wasn't until the 1990s that Democratic control began to implode, starting with the elections of 1994, in which Republicans gained control of both houses of Congress, through the rest of the decade. By the mid-1990s, however, the political value of the race card was evaporating and many Republicans began to court African Americans by playing on their vast dedication to Christian conservatism.[8]

Republicans first dominated presidential elections in the South, then controlled Southern gubernatorial and U.S. Congress elections, then took control of elections to several state legislatures and came to be competitive in or even to control local offices in the South. Southern Democrats of today who vote for the Democratic ticket are mostly urban liberals. Rural residents tend to vote for the Republican ticket, although there are sizable numbers of Conservative Democrats.

A huge portion of Representatives, Senators, and voters who were referred to as Reagan Democrats in the 1980s were conservative Southern Democrats. An Interesting exception has been Arkansas, whose state legislature has continued to be majority Democrat (having, however, given its electoral votes to the GOP in the past three Presidential elections, except in 1992 and 1996 when "favorite son" Bill Clinton was the candidate and won each time) until 2012, when Arkansas voters selected a 21-14 Republican majority in the Arkansas Senate.

Another exception is North Carolina. Despite the fact that the state has voted for Republicans in every presidential election from 1980 until 2008 the governorship (until 2012), legislature (until 2010), as well as most statewide offices, it remains in Democratic control. The North Carolina congressional delegation was heavily Democratic until 2012 when the Republicans had occasion, after the 2010 United States census, to adopt a redistricting plan of their choosing.

In 1992, Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton was elected President. Unlike Carter, however, Clinton was only able to win the southern states of Arkansas, Louisiana, Kentucky, Tennessee and Georgia. While running for President, Clinton promised to "end welfare as we have come to know it" while in office.[9] In 1996, Clinton would fulfill his campaign promise and the longtime GOP goal of major welfare reform came into fruition. After two welfare reform bills sponsored by the GOP-controlled Congress were successfully vetoed by the President,[10] a compromise was eventually reached and the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act was signed into law on August 22, 1996.[9]

During Clinton's Presidency, the southern strategy shifted towards the so-called cultural war, which saw major political battles between the Religious Right and the secular Left. Southern Democrats still did and do see much support on the local level, however, and many of them are not nearly so liberal as the Democratic party as a whole. Southern general elections in which the Democrat is to the right of the Republican are still not entirely unheard of.[11]

Chapman notes a split vote among many conservative Southern Democrats in the 1970s and 1980s who supported local and statewide conservative Democrats while simultaneously voting for Republican presidential candidates.[12] This tendency of many Southern whites to vote for the Republican presidential candidate but Democrats from other offices lasted until the 2010 midterm elections. In the November 2008 elections, Democrats won 3/4 the U.S. House delegation from Mississippi, 3/4th of the U.S. House delegation from Arkansas, 5/9th of the U.S. House delegation from Tennessee, and achieved near parity in the U.S. House Delegation from Georgia and Alabama. Nearly all white Democrats in the South lost reelection in 2010, however. In the November 2010 elections, Democrats won only one U.S House seat in Alabama, Mississippi and Arkansas and two out of nine House seats in Tennessee. Arkansas later lost its one seat in 2012. Following the November 2010 elections, there was only one white Democratic representative in the Deep South (John Barrow of Georgia), and he lost reelection in 2014. Democrats lost control of the North Carolina and Alabama legislatures in 2010, the Louisiana and Mississippi legislatures in 2011 and the Arkansas legislature in 2012. In 2014, the last damage occurred when Democrats lost 4 U.S. senate seats in the South (in West Virginia, North Carolina, Arkansas, and Louisiana) that they had previously held.

a This historically Republican part of Texas comprised chiefly Gillespie and Kendall Counties. b South of the MasonDixon line Carter won just 34 votes his own Georgia, plus Delaware, Maryland, and District of Columbia.

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Southern Democrats - Wikipedia

Democrats are maneuvering to claim the interests of the American people on their side, with a rallying cry of transparency. They're decrying a combination of quick hearings -- several key nominees will testify next week -- with what they say is a slow pace of nominees returning standard paperwork for vetting.

They want to put Trump on trial through his nominees, using the billionaires he's nominated to his Cabinet to call attention to conflicts of interest, and using conservative nominees to show how Trump has reversed course from previous campaign promises, according to aides and senators.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said Democrats want at least two days to review each nominee, full paperwork, tax returns for many of the nominees with complex financial records, and hearings spread out so members can attend as many as they want.

"There are a lot of questions about these nominees," Schumer said. "And I would like to succeed in negotiating something but we get full and fair hearings. ... There are so many issues about so many of them that to rush them through would be a disservice to the American people."

With a majority in the Senate, Republicans have a strong chance of confirming virtually all of Trump's nominees and are able to set the schedule and pace for the confirmation process. Several key nominees are set to testify next week, including Jeff Sessions as attorney general, Rex Tillerson as secretary of state and James Mattis as secretary of defense.

One senior Democratic leadership aide maintained that stacking up the hearings and nominees is "exactly the kind of thing that can cause trouble" for the GOP with Democrats.

Democrats are already getting backup from the progressive base. On Wednesday a progressive group launched an advertising blitz on television stations targeting vulnerable Republican senators to vote against Trump's nominee to run the Treasury Department, Steven Mnuchin. And more than 1,000 law school professors from across the country wrote a letter to the Judiciary Committee opposing Sessions, raising money to place the letter as a newspaper ad in senators' hometown newspapers. As of Wednesday evening, the effort had raised more than $15,000.

Republicans say that they are following precedent in moving quickly on the President-elect's nominees. Several of President Barack Obama's nominees were confirmed in a voice vote on Inauguration Day and most of the rest of them soon followed, noted Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's spokesman Don Stewart.

"When President Obama was elected, Republicans and Democrats worked together and expeditiously to carefully consider his nominees," Stewart said. "Sen. Schumer and others approved wholeheartedly of this approach at the time, so surely they won't object to treating the incoming president's nominees with the same courtesy and seriousness with which the Senate acted on President Obama's nominees."

McConnell told reporters on Wednesday that he hoped national security positions could move quickly.

But Democrats say speed wasn't a problem for the Obama nominees because his team provided adequate background on nominees, while Trump's camp has not.

"We are only expecting from the Trump nominees what the Obama nominees provided," said Missouri Sen. Claire McCaskill, who is the top Democrat on the committee that will confirm Trump's homeland security and budget picks. "All the Obama confirmations that occurred in the early weeks of the Obama administration, all of those things had been done. Only one nominee right now has that done, only one."

Democratic lawmakers repeatedly cited conflict of interest forms from the Office of Government Ethics, financial disclosures and background checks from the FBI that are mandatory for nominees.

"As Ronald Reagan said, 'Facts are stubborn things,' and ultimately I think if there is enough outcry and uproar about qualifications, that will have an effect," Connecticut Sen. Richard Blumenthal said.

Democrats don't have much say in when hearings are scheduled, but they can respond to a rushed hearing process by dragging out votes. Using procedural measures, Democrats could force each confirmation vote on the floor of the Senate to take up to a week, by insisting on cloture votes and full debate time for each nominee. That would string the confirmation process out over months and prevent any other legislation from getting done in the meantime.

Democrats aren't backing off their demands, saying if the stall tactics come into play, Republicans will "own it," per No. 3 Senate Democrat Patty Murray.

"If the Republicans can't come to a reasonable agreement and throw their first month or two into total chaos, it's on their back. We're willing to be reasonable," Schumer told CNN Wednesday. "We have a good deal of leverage. We hope we don't have to use it, but we have a good deal of leverage."

At least one Democrat up for re-election in 2018 in a state carried by Trump this November, McCaskill, said she wasn't concerned about being labeled an obstructionist in opposing nominees.

"That didn't seem to be a problem for (Sens.) Pat Toomey or Rob Portman -- and my recollection is they engaged in a whole lot of obstructionism," McCaskill said of two Republicans re-elected in battleground states this November. "I'm not going to be an obstructionist, but I'm going to do my job."

CNN's Jeremy Diamond and Ted Barrett contributed to this report.

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Democrats plan to put Trump on trial through his nominees ...

Democrats unseated two Republicans on the East Rutherford council, with George Cronk and Philip Sorbera II defeating incumbents Joel Brizzi and Michael Homaychak, according to unofficial results.

TARIQ ZEHAWI/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

A voter arrives with his son at his polling site at East Rutherford Firehouse on Carlton Ave on Election Day.

Democrat incumbent Wayne Hamer won in a landslide in the race for the citys 4th Ward council seat.

Democrats Thomas Mullahey and Mark Goldsack have won against Republican incumbent Mark O'Connor and Republican challenger Michael Duffy for two seats on the Rutherford Council.

Secaucus residents voted 3,170 to 2,042 to establish an open space trust fund to preserve remaining tracts of open space in the town. The result of the ballot initiative allows the town to establish an annual tax levy at the rate of 1 cent per hundred dollars of assessed value.

Emerson selected Gerald Falotico, a Democrat, and incumbent Councilwoman Danielle DiPaola, a Republican, to serve on the borough council on Tuesday night.

According to unofficial results Falotico received 1724 votes and DiPaola garnered 1720.

Kenneth Hoffman, who ran with DiPaola, received 1685 votes while Michael D. DeOrio, who ran with Falotico, gained 1490 votes.

BERNADETTE MARCINIAK/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

A voter exits Tenakill Middle School in Closter after casting her ballot on Nov. 8, 2016.

Unofficial election results Tuesday night show Democratic candidate Michael D. Warren has defeated Republican incumbent Kenneth J. Kovalcik by two votes for a seat in the Rochelle Park Township Committee.

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