Chuck Grassley: “I come to the Senate floor to discuss a pending nomination, that of Harvard Law School Professor David Barron to a seat…”

“I come to the Senate floor to discuss a pending nomination, that of Harvard Law School Professor David Barron to a seat on the First Circuit Court of Appeals. This nomination is exceptionally controversial and was voted out of our committee, the Judiciary Committee, on a 10-to-8 vote. Even a cursory look at Professor Barron's record reveals views on the Constitution and on federalism that are well outside the mainstream. But I want to put all those views aside and speak about this nomination from another point of view. So today I discuss Professor Barron's service as Acting Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Counsel in 2009 and 2010. According to multiple media sources, while heading up the Office of Legal Counsel, Professor Barron was instrumental in formulating the legal arguments that this administration used to justify the targeted killing of American citizens by drone strikes. According to press reports, Professor Barron wrote at least two legal opinions laying out those arguments. We also know the Department of Justice relied on the legal arguments Professor Barron formulated to justify the targeted killing of an American citizen in a tribal region of Yemen in September 2011. In a May 2013 letter to the chairman of our Judiciary Committee, the Attorney General wrote that ``since 2009, the United States, in the conduct of U.S.…”