the Supreme Court to fill the vacancy left by Sandra Day O'Connor's retirement. Some Democratic Senators attempted a filibuster; however, the entire Gang of 14 voted for cloture, which passed by 72 to 24 (with 60 "aye" votes needed). Several members of the Gang of 14 then voted against confirming Alito, including Republican Lincoln Chafee. Filibuster revisited in the 109th Congress In April 2006, Senate Republicans began pushing for the confirmation of two controversial conservative Court of Appeals nominees who had not been included in the Gang of 14 deal of 2005: district court judge Terrence Boyle and White House aide Brett Kavanaugh. Boyle had been first nominated to the Fourth Circuit in 2001 and Kavanaugh to the D.C. Circuit in 2003. Reid had then expressed concern over both nominees, threatening a possible filibuster of each one. On May 3, 2006, the seven Democratic members of the Gang of 14 wrote a letter to the Senate Judiciary Committee, requesting a second hearing for Kavanaugh. That request was granted the next day. On May 9, Kavanaugh appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee for his second hearing. Later that same day, the Gang of 14 met to discuss his nomination as well as the nomination of Boyle which had become embroiled in a debate concerning Boyle's failure to recuse himself in several cases. After the meeting, South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham declared that he saw no "extraordinary circumstances" concerning Kavanaugh's nomination. However, several Republican members of the "Gang" refused to address the status of Boyle. The Democratic members said they would request a second hearing for Boyle as they had done earlier for Kavanaugh. On Thursday, May 11, Kavanaugh was voted out of committee on a party line vote of 10–8 Two weeks later, on May 25, cloture was invoked on Kavanaugh by a vote of 67–30 with all but two members of the Gang of 14 voting to end debate. Senator Inouye voted against invoking cloture, and Senator Salazar did not vote. The next day, Kavanaugh was confirmed to the D.C. Circuit by a vote of 57–36. All of the Republicans and three of the Democrats (Byrd, Landrieu, and Nelson) in the Gang voted for confirmation. Before the Boyle nomination could be addressed, a controversy arose about the nomination of William Haynes, the general counsel of the Department of Defense, to be an appellate judge on the Fourth Circuit. When it