[Congressional Record Volume 163, Number 6 (Tuesday, January 10, 2017)]
[Senate]
[Pages S182-S183]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          CABINET NOMINATIONS

  Mr. SCHUMER. Mr. President, as hearings for the President-elect's 
nominees get underway starting today, I want to reiterate that a fair 
and thorough vetting process is a top priority, not only for my caucus 
but for the American people.
  Chief to achieving that is a fair hearing schedule and process. 
First, it means hearings that are sufficiently spaced out so Members 
who sit on multiple committees can actually attend all the hearings. It 
means only holding hearings after the full committee paperwork--OGE 
review, FBI background check, and a full divestment plan--has been 
received and Senators have adequate time to review the information. 
That means, if there are Senators with remaining questions that weren't 
covered in a first hearing, they can have the nominee come back for a 
second day.
  Our caucus and much of America was alarmed and disappointed by the 
announcements of the hearing schedule this week, which did not meet 
these basic courtesies and best practices that have always been 
extended in the past. However, I am happy to say that after negotiating 
with my friend the majority leader and his respective committee chairs, 
we have been able to make some progress on a fair hearing process.
  I appreciate the majority leader's openness and efforts to 
accommodate our caucus in the last few days. Originally there were six 
hearings scheduled for this Wednesday, all especially important Cabinet 
posts: State, Attorney General, Education, Transportation, Homeland 
Security, CIA. That was largely unprecedented. We have looked back in 
history and can only find one instance where there were that many 
hearings of important Cabinet members on one day like that.
  After negotiations with the majority leader, we have moved things 
around so

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that there are now only three hearings scheduled for Wednesday: 
Secretary of State, Transportation, and the second day of the AG 
hearings. All of these nominees have their paperwork in. The nominee 
for Secretary of Education, who does not yet have a signed ethics 
agreement and whose paperwork is not close to complete, was moved. That 
hearing will take place next week, pending her paperwork being 
submitted with time for Senators to review.
  It is still a busy week. It is a little too busy for my personal 
taste, but it is a good first step. I hope we can continue to negotiate 
in good faith, to sort out the schedule in a way that is acceptable to 
both of our caucuses.
  I also want to make clear that this progress does not mean our caucus 
is any less intent on having the President-elect's nominees complete 
the standard ethics forms, questionnaires, and FBI background checks 
required of every nominee. To have all this information come in after 
the hearing is sort of like ``Alice in Wonderland''--it makes no sense 
and has things upside down. I am still concerned, for example, that we 
don't have a completed FBI background check for the nominee for 
Secretary of State. His hearing starts tomorrow. And today there are 
reports in the media that under Rex Tillerson's leadership, Exxon 
conducted business with Iran, potentially in violation of U.S. 
sanctions law. There are serious questions that need to be answered.
  In this particular case, Mr. Tillerson should release all his tax 
returns and promise to answer any questions on the Iran dealings that 
members ask. This is too serious a subject to have questions ducked. It 
demands a completely open airing of all relevant information. Did Mr. 
Tillerson go around our Iran sanctions simply to line Exxon's pockets? 
That would be a very bad thing. The American people ought to know about 
it before the Senate has to vote to confirm. For Rex Tillerson to 
answer the questions, and particularly questions about Exxon setting up 
a separate subsidiary to get around our Iran sanctions, is what the 
Founding Fathers wanted us to do when they enumerated in the advise and 
consent process.
  This is not a partisan game. We are not doing this for sport. These 
aren't obscure procedural complaints. This is standard process. As I 
reminded my friend the majority leader yesterday, this is the same 
exact process my counterpart demanded in 2009 when the shoe was on the 
other foot. Just as then-Minority Leader McConnell laid out in his 2009 
letter to then-Majority Leader Reid, Democrats expect each nominee to 
have all the prerequisites, with time to review, before we move forward 
with the hearings. President Obama's nominees completed all of their 
paperwork in 2009 before the hearings. We expect nothing less from 
President-Elect Trump's nominees. Particularly, we expect the paperwork 
to be all in with time to review. Having the paperwork in at 7 a.m. and 
holding a hearing at 10 a.m. is unacceptable. We expect there will be 
adequate time for followup questions on a second day of hearings if 
Senators are unable to finish their questions.
  Today my colleague the majority leader said: Well, most of the 
Cabinet nominees were in already when this letter came out. But the 
letter doesn't specify who. It includes Cabinet members, and there were 
future Cabinet members who would come forward. It is a good standard. 
We are all for it. We are asking our friends on the other side of the 
aisle to stick with it. What was good for them in 2009 is good for the 
country in 2017.
  We are insistent on the process because it is the right thing to do; 
it is the American thing to do. We don't hide nominees and rush them 
through. They have huge power. If the President-elect and our 
Republican colleagues are as proud of the nominees as they state, then 
they should be happy to have them answer a lot of questions in a 
hearing that is not rushed. It is how we will ensure that Cabinet 
officials, who are imbued with an immense power in our government, are 
ethically and substantively qualified for these positions.
  If there is any group of Cabinet nominees that cries out for this 
process, it is this group of nominees. This proposed Cabinet is unlike 
any other. It is wealthier than any other. It has complex webs of 
corporate connections--so many of the nominees--that pose huge 
potential conflict of interest problems. Frankly, it is the most hard-
right Cabinet in its ideology. It is quite different from the way 
President-Elect Trump campaigned. The potential conflicts of interest 
for multimillionaires such as Rex Tillerson or Betsy DeVos or Steve 
Mnuchin are enormous.
  As I said, the nominees have views far to the right of what the 
President campaigned on. The most glaring example is Representative 
Price. His whole career has been focused on ending Medicare as we know 
it. My colleague the majority leader said the American people want us 
to move forward and give President-Elect Trump his nominees. If they 
knew that one of the nominees had been dedicated to basically getting 
rid of Medicare, would they want us to vote for him? I will bet not. It 
sure explains why they want to rush these nominees through.
  They don't want all of these things brought to light, but that is the 
wrong thing to do. We are going to fight to get to the right thing to 
do. The American people have a right to know if they voted for a 
President who might be going back on one of his key campaign promises. 
They deserve nothing less than open and deliberate hearings going 
forward. Will Representative Price stick with what President-Elect 
Trump said--no cuts to Medicare, Medicaid--or will he pursue his 
lifelong dream of privatizing and limiting them? We shall see, but we 
need answers at hearings before we vote. The American people are 
entitled to it.
  Once again, I thank the majority leader for dealing in good faith and 
trying to address our concerns. I hope for the sake of the national 
interests that our two parties can come together on an agreement for 
the remainder of the process, as we have for the process so far.

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