[Congressional Record Volume 164, Number 120 (Tuesday, July 17, 2018)]
[Senate]
[Pages S4994-S4998]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                     Nomination of Brett Kavanaugh

  Mr. President, having said that as a predicate, I want to turn to the 
nomination of Brett Kavanaugh to serve on the Supreme Court. Brett 
Kavanaugh used to clerk for a Federal judge named Walter Stapleton. 
Most people who are outside of the Delaware Valley--and maybe Maryland, 
Pennsylvania, New Jersey--haven't heard of Walter Stapleton. But if you 
have been involved in legal issues or judicial issues there, you may 
recall that he was nominated to serve as a district court judge, a 
Federal district judge, in Delaware and served there for a number of 
years with distinction.
  He went on to serve on the Third Circuit Court of Appeals in our 
region--again, serving with distinction. I think he assumed senior 
status in that court in 1999, after many years of service on the 
Federal bench.
  In the second half of the last century, he was seen as a giant in the 
judicial system--the Federal judicial system--certainly in our part of 
the world, but I think beyond our borders.
  When George W. Bush, my former colleague as Governor, as President, 
nominated Brett Kavanaugh to serve on the DC Circuit Court of Appeals, 
among the people I consulted with was former Judge Walter Stapleton and 
others who had clerked for him and worked with him. They knew Brett 
Kavanaugh and were very complimentary, as our colleague Rob Portman has 
been today, talking about the human side of him and the qualities I 
think we would admire in almost anybody.
  When I was a kid growing up, there used to be a guy on the radio--ABC 
radio--many years ago. His name was Paul Harvey. I don't know if our 
Presiding Officer is old enough to remember Paul Harvey. He would give 
the news, and he would do things like give the top of the news, and he 
would say ``Page 2''--and sort of like turn the page and report the 
rest of the news.
  I am going to go to page 2 here today with respect to Brett 
Kavanaugh. I voted for him. There are about a dozen Democrats in 2006 
who voted for cloture; four of us--Robert Byrd, Mary Landrieu, I think, 
Ben Nelson, and I--voted for confirmation. We voted our hopes rather 
than our views. We voted, in part, because of what we had learned from 
others who knew him, who had worked with him, and who admired him. I 
have said flatout that if I had known then what I know now about the 
kinds of decisions he would write and support over the following 12 
years, I would not have voted for him in 2006. I think it is highly 
unlikely I would vote for him today.
  I think it is time to hit the pause button on such consequential 
nominees, like Mr. Kavanaugh, whose writings have repeatedly made clear 
that he believes the President is above the law. This is a man, Mr. 
Kavanaugh, who worked with Kenneth Starr to go after Bill Clinton as 
President, hammer and tong, for alleged misdeeds and misconduct that he 
apparently had done.
  Now, some 20 years later, that same Brett Kavanaugh seems to have--
rather than feeling that Presidents definitely are not above the law, 
that Presidents have to be held accountable like anybody else, he seems 
to have done a 180. Instead, he basically seems to feel that Presidents 
are almost above the law and cannot be held accountable.
  I don't get it; I don't know how someone can change on something--it 
wasn't just during the Starr years. To have gone from that position of 
being such a fervent attack dog in going after Bill Clinton to 
basically saying that the Presidents can pretty much do, without 
oversight, what they see fit--that is one of the issues I want to 
discuss with Judge Kavanaugh, when I meet with him, hopefully later 
this month.
  For that reason alone--Judge Kavanaugh's views of the President, with 
the President being above the law, especially at this point in time in 
our Nation's history--I think that one issue, that one reason, should 
be enough to say let's hit the pause button. Let's hit the pause button 
on this nomination. There are a number of other reasons why Judge 
Kavanaugh is, in my view, the wrong pick for the Nation's highest 
Court. I want to stress just a few of those today.

  In May 2006, as a nominee to the DC Circuit Court of Appeals, Brett 
Kavanaugh made a pledge under oath. Brett Kavanaugh pledged to Members 
of this body that if confirmed, he would ``interpret the law as written 
and not impose personal policy preferences.'' Those are his words, not 
my words. Mr. Kavanaugh went on to pledge that he would ``exercise 
judicial power prudently and with restraint.'' Brett Kavanaugh pledged 
that he would ``follow precedent in all cases fully and fairly.'' Those 
are not my words; they are his words. Brett Kavanaugh pledged that he 
would, above all, ``maintain the absolute independence of the 
judiciary,'' which is, in his words, ``the crown jewel of our 
constitutional democracy.''
  I took Brett Kavanaugh at his word in 2006. I trusted him when he 
made those pledgees. I afforded Mr. Kavanaugh, as a young lawyer, the 
opportunity to fulfill his promise to faithfully uphold and interpret 
our laws as written. I expected him not to inject his personal policy 
preferences or the ideology of special interests and groups like the 
Heritage Foundation into his decision making on the bench.
  I know now, a little more than 12 years after he made those pledges, 
that

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my trust in Brett Kavanaugh was misplaced. As a judge on the DC Circuit 
Court of Appeals, Brett Kavanaugh has broken his pledges repeatedly.
  There is an old saying in my State: Fool me once, shame on you; fool 
me twice, shame on me. Judge Kavanaugh, shame on you, but you won't 
fool me twice.
  Brett Kavanaugh's broken pledges impact the lives of just about every 
American. They may well affect millions of Americans with preexisting 
conditions in years to come, who risk losing access to affordable 
healthcare, as well as a woman's freedom to make her own healthcare 
decisions. They affect hard-won workers' rights, consumer protections, 
and civil rights enacted into law over decades for the protection of 
future generations. They affect the independence of our judiciary and 
the system of three separate, coequal branches of government 
established by our Founding Fathers, a system designed to ensure that 
no citizen, not even the President of the United States, is above the 
law.
  Judge Kavanaugh's broken pledges affect the water we drink, the air 
we breathe, and the world we will leave to our children and our 
children's children. Today, we seek to shine light on Brett Kavanaugh's 
environmental record--one which, sadly, all too often puts the 
interests of polluters ahead of those of the public.
  One such example is when Mr. Kavanaugh rejected EPA's good neighbor 
rule, which regulates air pollution that travels across State lines to 
downwind States, such as Delaware, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, 
Connecticut, and others. In the case of EME Homer City v. EPA, he sided 
with polluters and ignored petitions from Delaware and eight other 
States, as well as the District of Columbia, when he said EPA lacked 
the authority to require upwind States to be better neighbors. Judge 
Kavanaugh's views were deemed too extreme even for some of the Supreme 
Court's conservative Justices, who reversed his decision, saying that 
he had followed his own policy views rather than the law written by 
Congress.
  Just yesterday, I was with First State officials and concerned 
citizens in the State of Delaware, all speaking out against the current 
EPA's misguided decision to reject Delaware's ability and that of our 
neighboring States to address dangerous pollutants blowing into our 
State from dirty powerplants to the west of us. Delaware families--
especially children and those with asthma--still suffer from harmful 
pollution that lands in our communities through no fault of our own. 
That is just not right.
  When I was Governor of Delaware for 8 years, from 1993 to 2001, I 
could have shut down my State's economy, taken every vehicle off the 
road, and shut down every business. We would have still been out of 
compliance for clean air with respect to ozone because of the air 
coming into our State from States to the west, our upwind States. Think 
about that.
  There is a reason why we have a golden rule. There is a reason why we 
talk about the Good Samaritan. There is a reason why we have the 
saying: We ought to treat other people the way we want to be treated. 
We want to be treated like a good neighbor. If the shoe were on the 
other foot, we wouldn't send our pollution to those States. EPA should 
stand up for our States and say enough is enough, but apparently Judge 
Kavanaugh disagrees.
  Brett Kavanaugh also dissented from an opinion on toxic air pollution 
written by Chief Judge Merrick Garland. In White Stallion Energy v. 
EPA, Mr. Kavanaugh said that EPA had to consider the costs to industry 
when determining whether powerplants should have to reduce toxic air 
pollution that causes cancer and lowers the IQ of children. Justice 
Scalia quoted Brett Kavanaugh directly when the Supreme Court later 
adopted Mr. Kavanaugh's position in another 5-to-4 decision, even 
though the Clean Air Act doesn't say a thing about having to consider 
costs.
  In Coalition for Responsible Regulation v. EPA, Mr. Kavanaugh 
rejected the longstanding interpretation that Congress gave EPA the 
authority to control any air pollutant, including greenhouse gases that 
contribute to climate change. Mr. Kavanaugh argued that taking the 
Clean Air Act at its word and interpreting ``any air pollutant'' to 
include greenhouse gases would lead to what he considered--again, as 
his own personal position and not as a matter of law--absurd results.
  Mr. Kavanaugh not only has proven to be untrustworthy in this regard, 
but he has already called into question EPA's authority to regulate 
greenhouse gases and combat climate change.
  These cases and the ideas advanced by Judge Kavanaugh in his opinions 
have striking similarities to those advanced by recently departed Trump 
administration official Scott Pruitt, and that should worry every 
Member of this body. Scott Pruitt may be out as Administrator at the 
EPA, but if Brett Kavanaugh is confirmed to serve on the Supreme Court, 
Mr. Pruitt's dangerous anti-environment agenda will continue to wreak 
havoc, this time with the weight of our Nation's highest Court behind 
it for a long time. Put simply, Brett Kavanaugh will attempt to finish, 
in many respects, what Scott Pruitt started.
  I take seriously the Senate's constitutional role of providing advice 
and consent on a President's nominee to the Supreme Court. As Governor 
of Delaware, I nominated scores of men and women to serve on our 
courts--supreme court, court of chancery, superior court--major courts 
not just for Delaware, actually, but for the country. I always felt 
that the Delaware Legislature should carefully consider my nominees, 
give them a hearing, meet with them, and in the end, vote them up or 
down.
  I felt we should have done that with Merrick Garland. We should have 
done that with Merrick Garland almost 2 years ago. We treated him 
shamefully--we didn't, but some in this body did. As such, I will 
afford Brett Kavanaugh the opportunity my Republican colleagues--at 
least most of them--refused Merrick Garland, chief judge of the DC 
Circuit Court of Appeals, highly regarded by Democrats and Republicans 
alike, when they abdicated their constitutional responsibilities in 
2016. Now they want to rush through, literally in only a couple of 
months, the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh.
  As I said earlier, I look forward to interviewing Brett Kavanaugh in 
the coming weeks and providing him the opportunity to explain why he 
broke his pledges time and again. How could a person who seems that 
nice and that decent make so many wrongheaded and I think wronghearted 
decisions and support those decisions from the bench time and again?
  We are in a battle on many fronts in this country. One of those 
battlefronts is with respect to our environment--the air we breathe, 
the water we drink, and the health of our people, young and old. We are 
fighting dangerous environmental rollbacks put forth by this 
administration--maybe not every day but just about every week. What we 
don't need in this country, where we have lived by and been sustained 
by an incredible system of checks and balances for years, for decades, 
for centuries, we don't need a Supreme Court that will similarly side 
with polluters over public health.
  I yield back my time.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The assistant bill clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, to follow up on the remarks of our 
distinguished Democratic ranking member on the Environment and Public 
Works Committee, Senator Carper, who spoke about the environmental 
prospects of Trump's nominee, Brett Kavanaugh, should he reach the 
Supreme Court, I come at this from a very particular angle. Let me 
start by kind of laying the predicate, if you will, for my comments.
  A long, long time ago, when the Founding Fathers were setting up our 
country, they brought over from England the tradition of an independent 
judiciary and of the common jury. It was extremely important to the 
founding generation. The Declaration of Independence made reference to 
efforts to interfere with the right to trial by jury.

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  The efforts by British agents of influence to interfere with American 
juries was a constant thorn. The feeling was that the independence of 
courts and, particularly, the independence of jurors was a very 
significant check and balance in the constitutional system that the 
Founders were setting up.
  These were experienced politicians. These were thoughtful people who 
had read and debated a lot about governance. They understood that there 
were times when very powerful interests were able to dominate a 
legislative body, there were times when very powerful interests were 
able to dominate a Governor or other chief executive and, indeed, there 
were times when that same very powerful interest could not only 
dominate the legislative branch but also the executive branch at the 
same time. Therefore, you needed to have a third branch of government--
an independent branch of government--to which you could go to be sure 
that you were being treated with justice. They designed it all fairly 
carefully.
  The jury has a lot of advantages to it. You don't get repeat jurors. 
Every jury veneer, every jury pool, is a new group. The reason for that 
is to make it hard for big interests to be able to go to people who 
might be jurors and try to fix the jurors in their favor in the same 
way they go to legislatures and try to fix legislators in their favor. 
You do not know who your jury is going to be until it is called up. So 
you can't apply influence to a jury. If you try, it is actually a 
crime. It is called tampering with a jury.
  We very carefully set up independent judges and pools of regular 
citizens who were to come in, virtually at random, to do one jury 
service and then to go back to their lives, and we did it for a reason. 
Blackstone described that reason as to provide a safeguard for regular 
citizens against other more wealthy and powerful citizens, more wealthy 
and powerful interests.
  It is an interesting piece of our constitutional analysis because, in 
most places, what has been set up is a structure that has been designed 
to protect the common citizen against the excesses of government. The 
checks and balances have been generally set up to protect the ordinary 
man and woman against excessive use of government power against them.
  With the juries, Blackstone said, it is a little bit different. It is 
not just abuse of power by government; it is abuse of power by the more 
wealthy and powerful interests, because the Founders knew that it would 
be the more powerful and wealthy interests who would come in and try to 
fix the legislature, who would try to fix the Governor or, at the 
Federal level, the President, and that, therefore, the jury would stand 
as the guardian and the bulwark of regular Americans against influence 
from the more powerful and wealthy interests.
  Look around at who the more powerful and wealthy interests are in our 
country right now. Collectively, the biggest is probably the fossil 
fuel industry. If you add up the whole Koch brothers' Koch Industries' 
apparatus, if you add up ExxonMobil, Chevron, Shell, and the whole 
American Petroleum Institute population, if you look at the extent to 
which they have seized control of the National Association of 
Manufacturers and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and if you put that 
whole array together, it is very likely not only the most powerful 
political influence effort now, but it may very well be the most 
powerful political effort in American history. Those wealthy and 
powerful interests are hard at work at making sure that their interests 
come first and that the interests of ordinary Americans come at a very 
distant second.
  The way in which Mr. Kavanaugh comes to this nomination smells of all 
of that influence already. For starters, he was selected through a very 
private process--from all of the information we have about it--that is 
moderated by a group called the Federalist Society but which checks in 
with all of the big Republican funding special interests to make sure 
that they are all OK with the nominee. There is a preclearance by 
special interests that takes place for these judicial nominees. 
Obviously, the most powerful and wealthy special interest--the biggest 
political force, perhaps ever--is going to be a part of that checklist.
  There can be no doubt that if the fossil fuel industry were not 
checked off on Brett Kavanaugh, he would not be the nominee. There is 
no doubt in my mind that they and other special interests--the gun 
lobby, the anti-choice crowd, the Wall Street folks--all had the chance 
to say: No, not that guy. Find me somebody who will be good to us.
  So Kavanaugh has already cleared that process. Now you see the 
confirmation process underway, and you see big special interests' dark 
money already out, campaigning for him.
  The last time we had one of these contests, it was this: Is it going 
to be Merrick Garland? No, we are going to stop him dead and not even 
give him a hearing. We are going to bring on this character, Gorsuch, 
and he is going to come in.
  Somebody spent nearly $18 million in political ads to support that 
switch. Somebody felt it was worth $18 million to have Gorsuch and not 
Garland on the Supreme Court. We don't know who that person was because 
of the dark money protections that are such a scourge in our democracy 
right now. That individual donor's hand is hidden behind all of this 
dark money machinery, but we do know that there is a person--an 
entity--who spent $18 million to have it be Gorsuch, not Garland.
  So that is the track record for this.
  Here comes Kavanaugh, and the same machinery is now up for him. He 
was precleared by the special interests, and big dark money interests 
are already spending money for him. Who in his right mind would believe 
that this guy is not predisposed in the direction of those big special 
interests? It is almost impossible to imagine under these political 
circumstances.
  When you look at his record on the DC Circuit, this is a guy who has 
been on the warpath against environmental protection. This is a guy who 
is Scott Pruitt in robes. This guy is really something.
  Now, he was not on the original Trump list, as I understand it. So 
maybe he has been spending his time auditioning on the DC Circuit for 
this incredibly dominant special interest--the fossil fuel industry--
and exhibiting his ability and his willingness to make anti-environment 
decisions, to make pro-corporate decisions, and to make pro-polluter 
decisions so that he can inch his way, maybe, onto the Trump list for 
the Supreme Court.
  Sure enough, not only is he on the list, but he is now the nominee. 
His record is absolutely abysmal. You would have to call him an 
environmental extremist. It is truly, truly exceptional to think of all 
of the different cases in which he has been involved. My colleague from 
Hawaii is here. So I am not going to go through them all, but as this 
goes forward, I will have plenty of time to explore these issues with 
him.
  It is going to be very, very important to the big polluters to have 
Kavanaugh instead of Kennedy because, when you look at the record in 
the Supreme Court, there has been a considerable array of decisions on 
environmental matters in which Justice Kennedy has been the swing vote. 
So extract Justice Kennedy with his retirement and put in Kavanaugh 
with his record from the DC Circuit, his preclearance by the polluting 
interests, and the fact that big-money folks are already out there 
pushing for him. They are going to want something.
  I suspect what they are going to want is a reversal of Justice 
Kennedy's position in favor of the environment and all of the issues on 
which he was the 5-to-4 tiebreaker in favor of the environment. Now all 
of those cases will go back the other way, and polluters will rule.
  Polluters already rule here. We are incapable of doing anything 
serious about climate change. Polluters completely dominate over in the 
House. They have written this ridiculous letter and have told the House 
that it shouldn't even do a carbon price. They have put all of their 
polluter front-group names on this letterhead. Of course, Trump still 
thinks that climate change is a hoax.
  You have a situation that the Founding Fathers were concerned about. 
You have an enormous special interest with extraordinary power that 
dominates the Senate and the House and that has completely gotten this 
administration by the choke chain. Now what it wants to do is to extend 
its power to the one

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part of the government the Founding Fathers set up to be able to tell 
the special interest no, to require it to follow the truth, to require 
it to look at real evidence, to subject witnesses to cross-examination, 
to provide discovery so that you know what is really going on, and for 
there to be penalties if you try to tamper and for there to be 
penalties if you lie.
  This is not the environment that the big polluters like. So they want 
to control it. I see the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh as an effort, 
basically, at agency capture at the Supreme Court level. We have to be 
very careful about this.
  I yield to my distinguished colleague from Hawaii.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Rubio). The Senator from Hawaii.
  Ms. HIRONO. Mr. President, I thank my colleague, the Senator from 
Rhode Island.
  In Hawaii, we understand the importance of caring for our planet. The 
Native Hawaiian community embraced the idea of ``malama `aina,'' a 
respect for and responsibility to care for the land in a way that 
protects our environment for future generations. That is why Hawaii has 
led the way in enacting measures to fight climate change and safeguard 
our natural resources. In the last few years alone, Hawaii has set 
ambitious goals to move to 100-percent renewable energy and become 
carbon neutral.
  We were the first State in the country to commit to meeting the 
objectives of the Paris climate agreement. In contrast, the Trump 
administration has spent the last year and a half disparaging the idea 
of protecting our land and natural resources. Donald Trump has taken 
action after action to prioritize the interests of his supporters in 
the fossil fuel industry at the expense of our environment.

  The President filled his administration with appointees who refuse to 
accept the realities of climate change. He named two Environmental 
Protection Agency Administrators--Scott Pruitt and Andrew Wheeler--who 
don't even believe in the EPA's mission of protecting the air we 
breathe and the water we drink.
  Administration officials have weakened rules that regulate pollution 
and protections for our natural resources. These actions have led to 
lawsuits by groups who embrace ``malama `aina'' and seek to protect our 
environment. These lawsuits will be decided by our courts. The outcomes 
will depend on an independent, fair, and unbiased judiciary.
  A number of these cases will come before the Supreme Court. In the 
October term, the Court will be hearing a case called Weyerhaeuser 
Company v. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to decide whether the Federal 
Government can protect endangered species on private land. Cases making 
their way through the lower courts include California v. EPA, which 
challenges the Federal Government's regulations on vehicle emissions, 
and West Virginia v. EPA, which challenges President Obama's Clean 
Power Plan. These cases raise crucial questions that will determine 
whether the government has the power to protect our environment. The 
answers to those questions may very well come from the Supreme Court.
  The President's nominee to the Supreme Court, Brett Kavanaugh, raises 
serious concerns about whether he would be that fair arbiter on 
environmental issues, the kinds of cases that will surely come before 
the Supreme Court. Throughout his time on the circuit court of appeals, 
Judge Kavanaugh has argued for weakening environmental regulations. 
Basically, his decisions benefit industry over the environment.
  In Coalition for Responsible Regulation, Inc. v. EPA, Judge Kavanaugh 
argued that the EPA should not regulate greenhouse gases under the 
Clean Air Act because the cost to business was more important than 
protecting the environment and public health from climate change. He 
said that the EPA should not include greenhouse gases in the 
interpretation of the statute that says EPA can regulate any air 
pollutant because, as far as Judge Kavanaugh was concerned, such a 
requirement or enabling the EPA to do that would result in higher costs 
for businesses. Judge Kavanaugh did not consider the cost to the 
environment.
  In Hawaii, we are already paying the price of climate change caused 
by greenhouse gases. Our coastlines are disappearing, corals in our 
oceans are dying, and catastrophic floods are becoming more frequent 
and more severe. The science behind the need to regulate greenhouse 
gases is clear. This message is lost on the President and apparently on 
Brett Kavanaugh, as he argued for a very limited interpretation of the 
EPA's authority to regulate.
  In another environmental case, Judge Kavanaugh sided with the fossil 
fuel industry in his dissent in White Stallion Energy Center v. EPA in 
2014. He argued that under the Clean Air Act, the EPA should not--
should not--regulate toxic air pollutants from powerplants without 
factoring in what those regulations would cost polluters. The majority 
disagreed with Judge Kavanaugh, saying that the EPA's approach ``is 
clearly permissible,'' consistent with prior Supreme Court instruction, 
and consistent with the purpose of the legislation, which was, of 
course, to protect the environment and the health and safety of people. 
When the case went to the Supreme Court, then-Justice Scalia quoted 
Judge Kavanaugh in his reversal.
  Judge Kavanaugh's opinions even went so far as to attempt to restrict 
the manufacture and sale of renewable fuel. In a 2012 case, Grocery 
Manufacturers Association v. EPA, Judge Kavanaugh opposed the EPA's 
grant of E15 waivers. These waivers would permit the manufacture and 
sale of a type of renewable fuel that would help our Nation decrease 
its dependence on foreign oil. In his dissent, Judge Kavanaugh argued 
that the EPA's rule permitting this renewable fuel would in effect 
force the production of renewable fuel. There is nothing in the statute 
that talked about forcing anybody to do anything. Actually, the word in 
the statute is ``permit.'' Permitting is not the same as forcing. Of 
course, Judge Kavanaugh certainly knew the difference before taking a 
position that supported the fossil fuel industry.
  Judge Kavanaugh's record on these environmental issues makes it 
highly likely that as a Supreme Court Justice, he would favor fossil 
fuel interests over human health, renewable energy, and protecting our 
planet.
  Senators have a constitutional responsibility to provide advice and 
consent on all judicial nominations, particularly those to the highest 
Court in the land, the Supreme Court. This responsibility requires us 
to take note of the fact that the Trump administration continues to 
fill the courts with deeply conservative, ideologically driven judges 
who will hold lifetime positions. The administration and their 
conservative allies expect that some of these judges will continue on 
to appellate courts and to the Supreme Court.
  Mr. President, this week, we will be voting on two nominees for 
Federal appellate courts: Andrew Oldham from Texas for the Fifth 
Circuit and Ryan Bounds from Oregon for the Ninth Circuit. I will be 
voting no on both of these nominations.
  Andrew Oldham has been an ideological warrior behind some of Texas 
Governor Greg Abbott's most extreme positions against a woman's right 
to choose, against LGBTQ people, and against solutions for the 800,000-
plus Dreamers put at risk for deportation by Donald Trump's rescinding 
of DACA.
  In 2013, as deputy solicitor general of Texas, Mr. Oldham defended a 
severe anti-choice Texas law, HB2, that put restrictions on doctors 
delivering reproductive healthcare. The restrictive provisions were 
upheld by the Fifth Circuit but struck down in a subsequent U.S. 
Supreme Court case called Whole Woman's Health v. Hellerstedt.
  In 2014, Mr. Oldham served as counsel of record for Texas in its 
successful challenge to the Deferred Action for Parental 
Accountability, or the DAPA Program. DAPA would have provided 
protections for the parents of Dreamers so families would not be 
cruelly separated, as we are seeing with such terrible and sad results 
today under Donald Trump's zero tolerance policy at the border.
  While Mr. Oldham was advising Governor Abbott on legislation, his 
boss supported or signed bills to restrict the rights of the LGBTQ 
community by regulating bathroom usage in public schools and allowing 
faith-based groups to deny adoptive and foster parents who conflict 
with their beliefs.

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  In his response to the Senate Judiciary Committee's questions about 
these extreme positions, Mr. Oldham sought to discount them as merely 
advocacy positions on behalf of a client, that being the Governor of 
the State of Texas, while Mr. Oldham's career shows otherwise.