[Congressional Record Volume 165, Number 77 (Thursday, May 9, 2019)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2751-S2752]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                              NOMINATIONS

  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, the Senate has continued to make 
significant progress in the personnel business. After 2 years of 
systematic heel-dragging from our friends across the aisle, even on the 
least controversial nominations, the modest reform the Senate adopted 
last month is helping us to get back on track.
  Another slate of capable nominees is now on its way to work for the 
American people. They are precisely the same sort of unobjectionable 
sub-Cabinet nominees who, until very recently, would have been 
subjected to 30 hours of debate. They would have tied up the floor for 
days before being confirmed anyway. They are perfect examples of why 
the Senate returned to our longstanding norms of processing lower level 
nominations. Now the American people are getting the government they 
elected at a more reasonable pace.
  To be clear, the silly partisan games haven't all been cleared away 
from our work on nominations. For example, just yesterday, we confirmed 
Judge Joseph Bianco to serve on the Second Circuit by a relatively 
close vote of 54 to 42. Remember, for a judge, in the scope of Senate 
history, that counts as a close shave. So are we looking at a 
controversial person? Are we looking at an individual whom the Senators 
agonized over and painstakingly studied?
  Judge Bianco brings a unanimous ``well-qualified'' rating from the 
ABA, and he has already served as a judge for 13 years in the Eastern 
District of New York. Oh, by the way, he was confirmed to that position 
by a voice vote. In fact, back then in 2005, one of Mr. Bianco's most 
vocal supporters in the Senate was none other than our friend the 
Democratic leader. Here is how he praised his New Yorker to the 
Judiciary Committee in 2005.
  Senator Schumer said: ``I am proud to support someone as 
outstandingly qualified and well respected as Mr. Bianco.''
  Well, that was then and this is now.
  The nominee is the same. Actually, he is not quite the same because 
now he has been a very highly regarded district judge for 13 years, so 
this nominee is actually even better. Yet the occupant of the White 
House is different. In this political moment, as we know, my Democratic 
colleagues' commitment to the ``outrage industrial complex'' seems to 
crowd out reasonable judgment.
  So now, this week, the Democratic leader lumped the same individual 
he used to champion into what he described as ``hard-right nominees.'' 
Then the Democratic leader and almost every other Member of his 
conference proceeded to vote against him. He voted against the same 
nominee he praised in such generous terms before.
  I can only conclude that now the ``outrage industrial complex'' comes 
first, not the facts, not the nominee's qualifications. The ``outrage 
industrial complex'' comes first. The individual whom the Democratic 
leader used to champion and who passed by a voice vote in 2005 now 
receives this partisan treatment. What was once a routine matter for 
acclamation becomes a party-line vote just because this President is 
the one who nominated him.
  Look, fortunately, at the end of the day, the outcome is the same. 
Judge Joseph Bianco, along with a slate of other well-qualified 
nominees, is now on the job, and the Republicans will

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continue our work to give the people the government they chose, the 
government they deserve.

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