William H. Frist: “in response, the Paez nomination--we will come back and discuss it further. Actually, I would like to come back to the…”

“in response, the Paez nomination--we will come back and discuss it further. Actually, I would like to come back to the floor and discuss it. It really brings to, I believe, a point what is the issue. The issue is that we have leadership-led partisan filibusters that have obstructed not 1 nominee but 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 in a routine way. The issue is not cloture votes per se; it is the partisan leadership-led use of the cloture vote to kill, to defeat, to assassinate these nominees. That is the difference. Cloture has been used in the past on this floor to postpone, to get more information, to ask further questions. But each and every time, the nominee, including Paez, got an up-or-down vote on the floor of the Senate where all 100 Senators could vote yes or no, confirm or reject. Paez got an up-or-down vote. That is all that we ask on the floor, that Priscilla Owen, that Justice Brown get a simple vote, approved, disapproved, confirmed, rejected. I yield the floor. The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Democratic leader is recognized.”