Political Quotes

“Mr. President, as we vote today on two nominations to the Court of International Trade, I want to note that this week we reached a milestone. It is 5 months into President Obama's second term, and we have just now reached the same number of circuit and district confirmations that President George H.W. Bush achieved in his 4 years as President. Of course, we remain nearly 20 confirmations behind the pace we set when President George W. Bush was in office. While some have argued that this is because President Obama has not made enough nominations, the fact is that he has sent up more district nominees at this point in his presidency than President George W. Bush had at the same point. The reason the Senate confirmations are lagging behind is because Senate Republicans have engaged in unprecedented obstruction of district court nominees. At this point in 2005, over 97 percent of President Bush's district nominees had been confirmed, but just 86 percent of President Obama's have been confirmed. Today's vote on Mark Barnett is also a milestone of a sort. He was one of the 11 judicial nominees who were stalled at the end of last year because Senate Republicans refused to allow him a vote. We are approaching the Memorial Day recess and the Senate is still working on nominations that could and should have been completed last year. These unnecessary delays on confirmations are bad for the Senate, bad for our Federal courts, and bad for the American people.…”