The LA Times is reporting that a powerful business lobby is preparing a multimillion-dollar campaign to aid the White House in its quest to win approval for conservative judges. The new effort on behalf of some of the nation’s biggest manufacturers will increase the cost, visibility and intensity of an already divisive confirmation process, one that has been dominated by social issues.

The shift puts the business lobby on the same side as social conservatives. The man behind the campaign is former Michigan Governor John Engler, a longtime friend of President Bush who recently took the helm of the National Association of Manufacturers.

Engler said in an interview Wednesday that his organization would make confirmation of judicial nominees a top priority for the first time–providing money and a recently honed ability to stir grass-roots action nationwide. The group plans to spend millions of dollars on the campaign, but the exact amount has not been decided. The Manufacturers Association represents such large, blue-chip firms as General Motors, Boeing and Caterpillar as well as 10,000 small and medium-sized manufacturers. Analysts say the campaign will increase pressure on moderate senators whose votes helped block confirmation for 10 of the 34 Bush nominees to federal appeals courts in the past two years. Several of those senators face reelection in 2006 and are already facing threats from religious conservative leaders if they try to block conservative jurists.