Patrick Leahy: “I would think so, I say to my friend from Illinois. Again, the point is the White House has had access to these papers.…”

“I would think so, I say to my friend from Illinois. Again, the point is the White House has had access to these papers. Surely they did a thorough review of this nomination. Surely someone in the administration must know what these documents contain if they are refusing to provide them and Republican Senators are asserting that they are ``privileged''. I would hope that no one, and certainly no one with legal training, would assert a privilege without knowing whether it applies. My recollection is that the administration took several weeks to respond to our request for the documents. Surely they were not simply ignoring our request for those weeks. I would have assumed they were using that time to review the documents and determine what could be produced immediately and what might require further discussion. They want to put this young man, at 41 years old, on the second highest court in the land. But they don't want us to know about his legal work and judgment when he was working for the government. They are saying: We'll nominate; you rubberstamp. I am saying it is advice and consent. That has worked in the Constitution for all the history of this country and will continue to work. We had an example of internal Justice Department documents that were the work on another of the President's controversial nominees that have previously been produced to the Senate. At least the papers came forth.…”