In recent years, the increased threat of a filibuster has led to a rise in the use of cloture to end debate in the Senate, especially on high-profile issues where the Senate is sharply divided, thus making the vice president's tie-breaking vote less likely to be used as the invocation of cloture requires a three-fifths majority (rather than a simple one). However, the cloture requirement was reduced to a simple majority for all executive and judicial nominations in 2013, except for Supreme Court nominations, which were included in 2017), which led to the first ever use of a tie-breaking vote to confirm a Cabinet member when Pence broke a tie to confirm Betsy DeVos in 2017. In 2018, Pence broke a tie to confirm Jonathan A. Kobes for the Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit in the first ever tie-breaking vote to confirm a judicial nominee in U.S. history.