Orrin Hatch: “Put it this way. If one of my excellent staff people was nominated to a Federal judgeship and somebody tried to pull…”

“Put it this way. If one of my excellent staff people was nominated to a Federal judgeship and somebody tried to pull that one over on me, I would raise such cane that it would blow the lid off this building, and I think anybody else would, too. You can imagine how the Solicitor General's Office must feel for this type of an inappropriate request for a confidential, privileged matter that they have to keep that way if they want to not chill honest discourse within the Solicitor General's Office. This is absurd. That is what they are pinning their hat on here. Let me tell you, if that is what it comes down to, it is going to be hard to get any judge through that one or the other side has a difference with in the slightest degree. There is no reason to disagree with Mr. Estrada. I have not heard one legitimate, good reason--not one yet.”