[Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 94 (Tuesday, June 17, 2014)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3691-S3692]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                            MORNING BUSINESS

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senate will be 
in a period of morning business until 11:00 a.m., with Senators 
permitted to speak therein for up to 10 minutes, with the time equally 
divided by the two leaders or their designees.
  Mr. REID. Mr. President, the distinguished senior Senator from Iowa 
is here to speak on one of the nominations. I am sure that if the 
Republican leader does come, he would yield to the Republican leader.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Iowa.


                           Kadzik Nomination

  Mr. GRASSLEY. For the third time in a couple weeks, I want to speak 
about one of the nominees we are going to be voting on today. That 
nominee is Peter Kadzik. He has been nominated to the Department of 
Justice's Office of

[[Page S3692]]

Legislative Affairs. He would have the position of Assistant Attorney 
General. Today I would like to make a few concluding comments about 
this nominee's record as well as this administration's record, more 
broadly speaking, with respect to congressional oversight.
  It is hard for me to imagine a nominee who is less suited to head the 
Office of Legislative Affairs than Mr. Kadzik. It is not a mystery how 
the nominee will run that office if he is confirmed, and we know that 
because he has been Acting Assistant Attorney General for well over a 
year, and he has a long and well-established history of contempt for 
congressional oversight authority. It is clear to me that when it comes 
to this nominee, past practice will be an accurate predictor of future 
performance. Unfortunately, there is a lot of evidence that justifies 
my conclusion. I will start with the nominee's record of contempt for 
congressional oversight even before he joined the Justice Department.
  When he was a private attorney back in 2001, the House ordered the 
nominee to testify as part of the Congress's investigation into the 
eleventh-hour pardon of billionaire tax fugitive Marc Rich. The nominee 
represented Rich. Not only did the nominee refuse to appear 
voluntarily, but he got on a plane to California the day before he was 
scheduled to testify before the House committee. In order to get him to 
testify before the House, the House had to send the U.S. Marshals to 
personally serve him with a subpoena in California. Isn't that a cute 
way to act when Congress is trying to speak to him? When he returned to 
Washington, he actually claimed that his lawyers had never bothered to 
mention the subpoena to him before he left on that plane trip to 
California. We know that claim isn't true because of handwritten notes 
that are now part of the record of this nominee's confirmation hearing.
  Unfortunately, things haven't improved much since then. The nominee's 
record as Acting Assistant Attorney General has been completely 
unacceptable. Senators' letters and questions go unanswered for many 
months before the nominee provides--most often--a largely nonresponsive 
reply. So, as I said last week, this administration is sending a 
message by nominating Mr. Kadzik to the Office of Legislative Affairs. 
That message is this: You can expect more of the same.
  I want to ask my colleagues this: How much more abuse of this body's 
prerogative by this White House are we willing to accept? How much more 
stonewalling of our legitimate, reasonable requests for information are 
we prepared to tolerate as we try to carry out our constitutional 
responsibility of oversight? How many more times do you intend to look 
the other way as this administration flaunts the law through illegal 
and unilateral executive action?
  In recent weeks the administration has raised the stakes. Two weeks 
ago the President approved the release of the Taliban five from 
Guantanamo without so much as a phone call to the chair or vice chair 
of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. Disposition of the 
detainees at Guantanamo is one of the most important issues related to 
the war on terror, and Congress has a well-defined role under the law 
when it comes to releasing dangerous terrorists. But the administration 
doesn't care about the role Congress has assumed for itself under the 
Constitution and under the laws we write. This administration has shown 
total contempt for its obligations under the law--a law they took an 
oath to uphold. I guess the President's view is that it is better to 
ask forgiveness after the fact than it is to abide by his 
constitutional obligation to follow the law and take care that law is 
faithfully executed.
  That is one reason why this nomination is so important. It is a 
perfect example of this administration's contempt for oversight and 
contempt for the law.
  This Senator believes Congress is entitled to learn why the 
administration thinks it is free to ignore the law. That is why I asked 
the Attorney General to provide the legal rationale for the President's 
unilateral executive actions that the Office of Legal Counsel gave to 
the administration that they could ignore the law that said they had to 
notify Congress 30 days ahead of time when they were going to release 
Guantanamo prisoners. But back in May the nominee refused to disclose 
the Office of Legal Counsel materials.
  Given the administration's flagrant disregard for the law governing 
the release of the Taliban fighters, I think my request to the Attorney 
General is all the more important right now. So I renew my request that 
the administration provide us with whatever advice it received from the 
Office of Legal Counsel before it decided to violate the National 
Defense Authorization Act and go forward with the stealth release of 
the Taliban prisoners.
  On June 5 I asked the Attorney General to provide the Justice 
Department's legal rationale by June 19, which happens to be just 2 
days from now. At the very least Senators should wait for a vote on 
this nomination until then so we can determine whether the Justice 
Department intends to comply with our request for the legal 
justification as to why the President could ignore the law when these 
prisoners were released. That would be a modest first step the 
administration could take to demonstrate it is serious about respecting 
oversight authority and the constitutional responsibility of the 
Congress to do that oversight and whether or not they respect the 
separation of powers under the Constitution.
  I will conclude. My colleagues know this nominee embodies the 
administration's disregard for oversight authority and its dismissive 
approach to its legal obligations.
  That much is clear. But my colleagues also need to remember this: If 
they vote for this nominee, they are voting to diminish congressional 
authority. If they vote for this nominee, they are voting to give the 
President more of a free pass than he already assumes--and specifically 
in this case on the unlawful release of Taliban fighters. They are 
voting also to empower unlawful execution of executive actions by this 
and future administrations. They are voting to chip away at the network 
of checks and balances that undergirds the relationship between the 
executive and the legislative branches--the very signal the 
Constitution writers sent to the Colonies that they didn't want one 
person making decisions in our government; they wanted that to be 
divided authority.
  Also remember that one day the shoe may be on the other foot. One day 
there may be a Republican administration that is just as cavalier about 
its legal obligations. If that administration ignores our oversight 
request, any Senator who voted for these people will have no right to 
complain.

  I urge Senators to stand up for the Senate's constitutional 
responsibilities of oversight and stand up to this administration and 
vote no.
  I yield the floor.

                          ____________________