James Lankford: “over the last several weeks, we have worked at record pace here in the Senate on nominations. This has been one of those…”

“over the last several weeks, we have worked at record pace here in the Senate on nominations. This has been one of those tasks that happen literally every time there is a new President that comes in, but the pace we have moved on nominations has been epic based on the last two terms of different Presidents. We have confirmed more people now in the Senate than were confirmed in the first 3 weeks of the Biden administration and in the first 3 weeks of the first Trump administration combined. It is because we have been willing to be able to run the clock and to be able to compress this. Now, the nominations process does take a long time. Every single one of the Cabinet officials requires 30 hours of debate here in the Senate. Each one of the other individuals requires 2 hours of debate here in the Senate, and we have 1,200 people total that we have to get through. But, at the beginning of this time period, we focused on the Cabinet- level officials, moving, for instance, Marco Rubio the very first day of the President being inaugurated, and we came into this Chamber that evening and were able to move Marco Rubio. We started the hearings before the President was even sworn in, to be able to make sure that we are ready. We are literally doing hearings in committees, cueing up the next people, even as we are dealing with the folks that are on the floor, to be able to make sure we can move as rapidly as possible. This is not just about President Trump.…”