Lance Gooden: “Before I close, I will be nice and give my friends across the aisle a little gift. I realize they think all these are…”

“Before I close, I will be nice and give my friends across the aisle a little gift. I realize they think all these are great, so for the sake of being bipartisan, I am going to give an example of a bad actor that was a Republican with respect to these slush funds. Back in 2005, then-United States Attorney Chris Christie required the pharmaceutical company Bristol Myers Squibb to donate to his law school alma mater, Seton Hall University. In exchange for not charging the drug-making giant with securities fraud, Christie's office would require it to fund a professorship at Seton Hall University Law School, Christie's alma mater. Do we really think that is good policy? It doesn't matter who is in the White House, what party is controlling the executive branch, this is a wrong policy. I hope this bill passes. My colleague did say it is dead in the Senate. Let's just assume it is dead in the Senate. I pledge here before this entire body that if we have a Republican President someday, I will carry this bill forward, and I am willing to bet that someone across the aisle will join me because they won't like the conservative, far-right groups that a Republican Justice Department is diverting slush funds to. I hope that my colleagues will get on board now.…”