congressional_record: CREC-2008-12-11-pt1-PgS10913
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| CREC-2008-12-11-pt1-PgS10913 | 2008-12-11 | 110 | 2 | HOLDER NOMINATION HEARING SCHEDULE | SENATE | SENATE | ALLOTHER | S10913 | S10914 | [{"name": "Chuck Grassley", "role": "speaking"}, {"name": "Harry Reid", "role": "speaking"}] | 154 Cong. Rec. S10913 | Congressional Record, Volume 154 Issue 186 (Thursday, December 11, 2008) [Congressional Record Volume 154, Number 186 (Thursday, December 11, 2008)] [Senate] [Pages S10913-S10914] From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov] HOLDER NOMINATION HEARING SCHEDULE Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I would like to discuss Eric Holder's nomination to be the U.S. Attorney General. While Mr. Holder appears to have the appropriate credentials and work experience, it is important that the Judiciary Committee be able to fully and carefully vet the candidate for this important position because this is the Nation's top law enforcement officer. I was surprised to hear that the chairman of the Judiciary Committee noticed Mr. Holder's confirmation hearing for January 8, 2009. Mr. Holder was only formally announced as the prospective Attorney General nominee on December 1 of this year. I understand the Judiciary Committee has a large number of boxes of archived documents relating to his employment at the Justice Department, and those materials need to be reviewed. We have not even gotten Mr. Holder's questionnaire, nomination materials, or FBI background investigation yet. Judiciary Committee members just sent a letter to the Justice Department and the Clinton Library requesting documents relating to issues that Mr. Holder was involved in during his tenure in the Clinton Justice Department. Once we get these materials and once these documents come to us, it will take some time for committee members to review them. While it is not unprecedented for the Judiciary Committee to hold a hearing prior to the inauguration of a President, such as the one held for former Attorney General John Ashcroft, there are significant differences. First, the Ashcroft nomination hearing was held from January 16 to January 19, 2001, obviously giving committee members more breathing room to review his record. Moreover, Attorney General Ashcroft was a well-known quantity to us because he served as our colleague in the U.S. Senate and he was a prominent member of the Judiciary Committee. Of course, this was all prior to his nomination for Attorney General. Even then, my colleagues on the other side of the aisle insisted on 2 days of testimony from the nominee and 2 days of testimony from 23 other outside witnesses, for a total of 4 days of hearings. The bottom line is that the proposed January 8 hearing timetable doesn't give members a full and fair chance to consider Mr. Holder's background as thoroughly as we should. We must have time to comprehensively examine all of Mr. Holder's information, materials, and documents, most of which we haven't even received yet. There is no need to jump the gun and undermine our oversight responsibilities. This is all the more important because Mr. Holder is not a nominee free and clear of issues. The fact is Mr. Holder played a very key role in some very controversial matters, and since his nomination, a number of newspapers, including the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the Wall Street Journal, have all published articles reminding the public of those controversies and raising serious questions about Mr. Holder's role in them. These issues need to be fully considered by members of the Judiciary Committee and eventually by the full Senate. For example, red flags about Mr. Holder's judgment and independence include his role in securing pardons or clemency for an unrepentant billionaire fugitive tax cheat such as Marc Rich or terrorists such as members of the FALN and Weather Underground. A lot of people--including this Senator--have found these facts to be troubling. As I previously mentioned, a number of editorials have been written asking questions about how those facts impact Mr. Holder's ability to serve as U.S. Attorney General. I expect to question Mr. Holder at his confirmation hearing about these and other controversial matters he has been involved with. [[Page S10914]] In addition, Mr. Holder has been in private practice since he left the Clinton Justice Department over 8 years ago. It is important that we know what Mr. Holder has been doing in those 8 years, which cases he has been involved with, and who his clients are, what speeches he has made, and so forth. For example, public reports have emerged that in 2004, the Governor of Illinois hired or sought to hire Mr. Holder. We certainly need time to learn what that is all about. Mr. Holder has not provided the committee with all of this information yet. Again, it is not unreasonable for members of the Judiciary Committee to want to receive all of these materials and have ample opportunity to study them before holding the nomination hearings. As such, I, then--this Senator, then--is in support of Senator Specter's request that Chairman Leahy move the hearing to a later date in January so committee members can do their duty and review Mr. Holder's nomination in a responsible manner. I yield the floor. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The majority leader is recognized. Mr. REID. Mr. President, we have been working, as I think the country knows and the Senate knows, for the last many weeks trying to come up with some way to resolve the issue of dealing with Detroit and the automobile manufacturers. We thought we were at a place today where we would have a series of votes and we were almost there when another Senator submitted another idea. As a result of that, there are good- faith negotiations going on as we speak. The last I heard is that they would have something completed by 5:30. I kind of smile when I say that, because considering the years I have spent here in the Senate, sometimes I don't know if they are referring to ``5:30'' meaning 10 minutes from now or 12 hours and 10 minutes from now, but they said 5:30. If they are able to work that out, then the bill will overwhelmingly pass the Senate. I have told the House and the House will have to do whatever they do with that. But right now, that is not done. As I indicated, they said they thought a half hour or so ago it would be done by 5:30. I hope that is the case. I know it is late. I know people want more definite definitions of when this is all going to happen, but that isn't the way the Senate works, as much as we would all like it to be. So if everyone will be patient, there is still a possibility--and even maybe a probability--that sometime this evening we would be able to vote. Now, Senator McConnell and I don't know at this stage what we will be voting on. If the negotiations which are going forward now bear fruit, then that will be the issue that I think would pass with a significant margin here in the Senate. There may be some other Senators who want to offer alternatives. I think there may be some suggestions for that to take place. At this stage, I think it is pretty clear that there is no need to vote on the House measure, because it is pretty clear there aren't enough votes to pass that, but those decisions we will make shortly. I think what we are going to be voting on is a series of competing alternatives. There is not going to be an opportunity to offer a lot of individual rifleshot amendments to these different proposals, but I know that a number of Senators have one proposal. We have the one we talked about we will probably vote on today, and then we have the bipartisan issue that is being worked on right now. If we are fortunate, maybe we could wind up having three votes or maybe only two votes. But, anyway, we are doing our best to resolve this issue. There is no need to talk about all of the Senators involved. We will do that if we can work something out and they will get all the accolades they need. We have had a lot of cooperation today. That doesn't mean we are going to be able to work something out, because this is a very important issue. But right now, I think we are a lot further down the road than I thought we would be. I was trying to think: Down the road distance, so it should be ``farther'' down the road. But, anyway, I wish to alert everyone they should be patient tonight. We hope to have some votes before the night is out. If everything falls apart, then we will be left with having a cloture vote on the Democratic version. Regardless of whether we work something out, that would be tomorrow morning, as early as we want to come in, but hopefully, that is not the resolution of this because that may not be the best way to solve the problem of Detroit. ____________________ |