Political Quotes

“I wanted to come to the floor and talk for a few minutes about the unfortunate circumstances we find ourselves in as a result of the failure of the Ranking Member of the Judiciary Committee to submit a letter that she received from--in this case, we now know--Dr. Ford to the background investigators, who are bipartisan, who would have investigated this matter during the normal course of the confirmation process in a way that protected the anonymity and confidentiality of Dr. Ford, as well as the nominee. As the Presiding Officer knows, having been a longtime member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, frequently during the course of a background investigation, we will learn things that Senators will want to ask the nominee about, but some of them are so sensitive and, frankly, some of them involve allegations we just don't know whether there is any basis to them or not. So they are handled in a particularly careful manner by the background investigators, and they are not generally made available to Members of the Judiciary Committee staff because they are so sensitive and potentially embarrassing. Frankly, we just have to get to the bottom of them, but we want to do so in a way that is respectful of both the person making the accusation as well as the nominee. Unfortunately, none of that happened here because we now know that the ranking member, our friend Senator Feinstein, sat on this letter for some 6 weeks.…”