Political Quotes

“I come to the floor to oppose the nomination of Janet Dhillon to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. I have a number of concerns about her record, which I plan to lay out here today, but before I do, I want to talk about the process by which this nomination has come to the Senate floor. It has long been common practice in the Senate to confirm nominees to independent agencies as pairs--one Republican and one Democrat. We do this so agencies like the EEOC are balanced and are able to fully function no matter which party is in the White House. In the case of the EEOC, it ensures workers are being protected from discrimination in the workplace. Yet, at every opportunity, Republicans have broken norms and abandoned longstanding practices to jam through their nominees. First it was the National Labor Relations Board, when my colleagues across the aisle jammed through two Republican nominees without any Democrats and then refused to give a highly qualified nominee another term on the Board--all because that highly qualified nominee was fighting on the side of workers, not corporations. Then one lone Republican was allowed to object to the reconfirmation of a well-respected Commissioner to another term on the EEOC, even if that meant the EEOC would no longer have a quorum and be able to perform some of its most critical duties.…”