Political Quotes

“Mr. President, today our body, the Senate, is going to vote to confirm the 15th judicial nominee for this year. If it seems to my colleagues and to the public that we have been voting on a nominee every week, well, we have been voting on a nominee at least once a week. Both in committee and on the floor, judicial nominees have regularly appeared on the Senate's agenda. We have taken positive action on 34 of the 61 judicial nominees submitted to this Congress by President Obama. We continue to hold hearings every 2 weeks to examine the nominees' records and to receive testimony. The committee meets every week to report nominees to the floor. So far, the committee has reported 27 nominees, which is ahead of the 23 reported by this same time in the 108th Congress. This demonstrates my commitment and the commitment of Republicans on the Judiciary Committee to cooperate with the chairman to move forward on consensus nominees. Even as we do so, we continue to thoroughly examine the records and the qualifications of all nominees, which is the responsibility of the Senate. I would note that a number of judicial nominations and at least one executive branch nomination which remain on the Senate's Executive Calendar are controversial in nature--in other words, not the consensus approach which I have spoken about concerning other nominees to the judiciary. I appreciate the efforts of our leadership to move in a timely manner the nominations which are consensus nominees.…”