Bob Menendez

So is this an area the Bureau is going to be looking at?

In my opinion, Judge Shwartz did not adequately demonstrate the breadth of knowledge of constitutional law and pivotal Supreme Court decisions, such as Citizen United, that we should expect from a United States circuit court judge.

These are lifetime appointments to the Federal bench and should not be taken lightly.

As the nominee's home State Senator, I take my advise and consent role for judicial nominations extremely seriously.

I am here today to express my unqualified support for Judge Patty Shwartz for the third circuit court of appeals.

It is ironic that he is seen as the populist when at the same time, it is almost like a Roman circus.

So if you think about it, both what he is doing throughout the hemisphere and what he is doing in this transaction, which is a very interesting one for you to note, is undermining the long-term national interest of the people of Venezuela.

But taking your point, this is what I see on the horizon for the people of Venezuela.

He is using the nation's resources for his own political aggrandizement.

Hugo Chavez is using the national patrimony of Venezuela to buy both influence in the hemisphere and, of course, in his own election.

I was reading the comments of the candidate. And maybe he is not going to have any chance to win, but sometimes when you do not have a chance to win, you say things that either can be outrageous or can be very honest.

But it has become now more of a consuming country because the cartels and the traffickers are----

In my personal view it was good that President Fernandez and the Dominican Government were seeking to try to control their airspace.

Well, thank you all for your testimony.

Well, with my thanks to this panel for all of your insights and for all of your missions and particularly, Mr. Benson, to you and the men and women of the DEA, thank you very much.

I do not want to be obfuscated by the fog of 'let us cut at any cost' when in fact there are some things for which the national interest and security of the United States still calls for.

There is no question that we have to cut our national debt. There is no question that we have to meet our challenges.

At the end of the day, it is along Central America. We squeeze there and now we see the Caribbean which is very porous.

Is it fair to say that the reductions that we are seeing here are going to have consequences in terms of the fight that we need to continue?

I appreciate, more importantly, however, the role in informing Congress of the underlying decisions for public policy.

I see the administration asking for less funding for CBSI in fiscal year 2012.

But it sounds like in the case of DEA's challenge, enormous as it is, in some cases you have to work around these governmental entities where some of the highest levels of the government seem to be corrupted by the drug traffickers, and…

Are you familiar with the fact that we have canceled a series of visas of persons from the Dominican Republic, as well as officials from the Dominican Republic, because of issues of corruption and narcotrafficking?

I want to discuss specifics about what is happening in the Dominican Republic.

We are at the risk of converting ourselves into a narcostate.