WASHINGTON—In an effort to blend two barely compatible legislative goals, the Senate announced Wednesday that it would postpone confirmation hearings for President Trump’s pick for Director of National Intelligence until senators pass a voting reform bill already declared constitutionally allergic to Senate passage.

“If Americans want someone overseeing their top secret agencies, all they need to do is convince 60 senators to end partisan gridlock,” explained Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, squinting at a stack of parliamentary procedure binders and a pile of shredded voter registration forms. “It’s called democracy, look it up.”

President Trump weighed in via Truth Social, declaring, “There shall be no intelligence until the votes are correctly counted — or never, whichever comes last.” Press Secretary Janelle Snarkington later clarified the president’s position: “We believe the only way to ensure free and fair nominations is to tie them to a unicorn sighting and the approval of at least three cranky aunts from Ohio.”

Opponents criticized the move as a cynical ploy. “This is just the latest effort to make government appointments as convoluted and slow as using fax machines to register to vote,” said Senator Krakowski D-TX, who attempted to file a protest but was told to come back after she solved the Senate’s new 3D Sudoku filibuster challenge.

As of press time, the Senate was reportedly considering attaching the intelligence confirmation to a bill requiring all ballots to be notarized in invisible ink, and then buried inside a hollowed-out copy of the Constitution.