Delaware Gov. Meyer wins fight with Senate Democrats over right to send own nominees for port board

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This story was supported by a statehouse coverage grant from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

The Delaware Supreme Court sided with Gov. Matt Meyer in his fight with state Senate leaders over nominees to the Port of Wilmington.

Meyer and Senate Democrats were at odds over whether Meyer could withdraw names submitted by former Lt. Gov. Bethany Hall-Long during her two weeks as governor after Gov. John Carney resigned early to become mayor of Wilmington. Supreme Court justices ruled in an advisory opinion that the governor had the authority to change nominations up until confirmation.

“We need to move our port forward for the benefit of all Delawareans, not for a small group of insiders,” Meyer said in a statement after the ruling. “Together we can realize the port’s potential to create thousands of quality union jobs.”

In a joint statement by Senate leadership after the opinion was issued, the Democrats said their singular goal “has been to ensure that the job creation and economic growth promised by the port expansion project remains a top focus.”

“With this chapter behind us, we reiterate our simple request: that Gov. Meyer offer up his own slate of port appointees who will fight for the union families for whom port expansion is a lifeline,” said Sens. David Sokola, Elizabeth “Tizzy” Lockman and Bryan Townsend. “Appointees who are committed to fulfilling the economic promise of this historic infrastructure investment.”

Hall-Long nominated prominent labor leaders and renominated former Delaware Secretary of State Jeffrey Bullock and the board’s former chairman to the Diamond State Port Corporation Board during her brief tenure in office.

Meyer sent a letter to Senate leaders after he was inaugurated in January, withdrawing his predecessors’ nominations to the port board. But senators, calling the names “valid,” moved ahead with a confirmation hearing on the people Hall-Long submitted at the end of January.

The day was spent with Meyer threatening legal action if senators continued and both sides trading insults. By the end of the day, the parties had decided to leave the question up to the court.

In its analysis, justices said the Delaware Constitution places the appointment in the executive branch and submitting nominations to the Senate is just the first step in the process and is the purview of the governor. It rejected the argument by lawmakers that names that have already been submitted to the Senate cannot be withdrawn because those nominations are “appointments,” which is the Senate’s exclusive jurisdiction.

The Diamond State Port Corporation, a quasi-public entity that oversees the Port of Wilmington, has been seeking to build a $635 million container terminal at the Edgemoor property on the Delaware River. Sokola said during the January confirmation hearing that they were holding the hearing because the port project is one of the most critical infrastructure projects in the state’s history.

But the Meyer administration has argued that allowing Hall-Long to make the recommendations would be a repudiation of voters who chose him over Hall-Long in last year’s Democratic primary by 10 percentage points. Meyer also beat former environmental protection chief Collin O’Mara in that primary, who garnered about 16% of the vote.

The project to expand the port has been the subject of legal challenges from the Philadelphia Regional Port Authority and ports affiliated with Holt Logistics Corp., whose affiliates operate terminals in Philadelphia and South Jersey. They sued the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers after it had approved the Delaware expansion plans. They argued that the new Edgemoor port would divert shipping to Delaware from Philadelphia.

U.S. District Judge Mark Kearney of the Western District of Pennsylvania blocked the project last year by invalidating key permits from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. He ordered a closer, more in-depth review of the project.