Florida Sen. Bill Nelson Clarence (Bill) William NelsonDemocrats sound alarm on possible election chaos Trump, facing trouble in Florida, goes all in NASA names DC headquarters after agency's first Black female engineer Mary W. Jackson MORE (D) is blocking quick confirmation of three Trump administration nominees, saying he hasn’t gotten sufficient assurances regarding offshore drilling off Florida’s coasts.

Nelson spokesman Ryan Brown said the senator sent Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke Ryan Keith ZinkeTrump extends Florida offshore drilling pause, expands it to Georgia, South Carolina Conspicuous by their absence from the Republican Convention Trump flails as audience dwindles and ratings plummet MORE a letter last week seeking details on Zinke’s pledge to remove Florida from consideration for drilling.

But Zinke hasn’t responded to that letter, prompting the hold late Wednesday on three Interior Department nominees.

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Brown said Nelson “will keep the holds in place until Zinke rescinds the draft five-year drilling plan published in the Federal Register on Jan. 8 and replaces it with a new draft plan that preserves the current moratorium in the eastern Gulf of Mexico beyond 2022 and fully protects all of Florida’s coasts from the threat of both offshore drilling and seismic testing.”

After a brief meeting last week with Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R), Zinke said Florida’s waters would be taken out of the drilling plan.

Nelson has been fighting for years to stop drilling near Florida. He is suspicious of Zinke’s decision and accused him of doing it as a gift to Scott, who is likely to run for Nelson’s Senate seat, an accusation the Trump administration has denied.

A hold all but prevents the Senate from voting on the nominees. It stops Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell Addison (Mitch) Mitchell McConnellObama calls on Senate not to fill Ginsburg's vacancy until after election Planned Parenthood: 'The fate of our rights' depends on Ginsburg replacement Progressive group to spend M in ad campaign on Supreme Court vacancy MORE (R-Ky.) from getting “unanimous consent” to skip the 30 hours of debate that Senate rules technically require for each nominee, but that is waived in most cases, except some Cabinet officials.

The three nominees at issue are Susan Combs for assistant secretary for policy, management and budget; Ryan Nelson for solicitor and Steven Gardner for director of the Office of Surface Mining.

All three were approved by the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee last year.

Due to objections by Democrats, they were not held over to 2018 and instead sent back to the White House. But President Trump Donald John TrumpObama calls on Senate not to fill Ginsburg's vacancy until after election Planned Parenthood: 'The fate of our rights' depends on Ginsburg replacement Progressive group to spend M in ad campaign on Supreme Court vacancy MORE renominated each of them this month, so the Energy and Natural Resources panel will have to vote on them again before they can proceed.