Jeff Bingaman: “Senator Jeff Bingaman and Senator Tom Udall, for their foresight and vision in protecting this national treasure.”

I think all of us, if we were choosing a Secretary of Energy, would want to choose somebody with those attributes.

I would certainly like to thank Senator Bingaman, who just retired just very recently, for the strong support that he has shown me over the years, and including support for this nomination.

The President, in my view, could not have chosen a better nominee for the position than Mike.

In December 2010 U.S. Senators Tom Udall, Tom Harkin, and Jeff Bingaman requested an independent study from the National Academy of Sciences on whether chimpanzees are necessary as invasive research subjects.