Political Quotes

“Mr. President, I am on the floor this afternoon with a request to confirm a highly qualified nominee with bipartisan support, whose nomination has stalled for 210 days since it was approved by the Finance Committee. My understanding is there may be an objection to a unanimous consent request that I would like to offer, and, hopefully, any Senate Republican who seeks to object will come to me. And I hope, whatever concern they have--if, in fact, it is the case--that we can work it out and this very, very qualified individual can serve as Commissioner on Children, Youth, and Families within the Department of Health and Human Services. I am talking about Rebecca Jones Gaston. And my view is that this Agency is a hugely underappreciated part of our government. Its whole mission is to help vulnerable kids and families stay safe and get ahead in life. It is challenging work, and that means you have got to have strong leadership in place. One of the big recent jobs for this Agency has been implementation of the Family First Prevention Services Act. Our colleague, the late Orrin Hatch, and I worked on this for years because we wanted to transform the child welfare system, and that is an undertaking now underway because Chairman Hatch went to members on the other side of the aisle and reached out. And we built a coalition for this hugely consequential bill.…”