[Congressional Record Volume 168, Number 148 (Wednesday, September 14, 2022)]
[Senate]
[Pages S4605-S4609]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
Unanimous Consent Request--Executive Calendar
Mrs. SHAHEEN. Madam President, I am very pleased to be on the floor
today with my colleague Senator Hirono to express our strong support
for the nomination of Dr. Geeta Rao Gupta to be Ambassador at Large for
Global Women's Issues at the Department of State.
The position that Dr. Gupta has been nominated for leads the Office
of Global Women's Issues, which is charged with advancing the rights
and empowerment of women and girls around the world through U.S.
foreign policy, so looking at our foreign policy through a gender lens
that recognizes that women are half of the world's population.
Not only does the Office of Global Women's Issues prioritize policies
and programs to advance the status of women around the world, it
ensures that U.S. policies incorporate a gender lens at all levels of
policy and decision making.
The last 2\1/2\ years of the COVID-19 pandemic have demonstrated why
this office is more important than ever before. Around the world over
those last
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2\1/2\ years, the gender gap has grown as a result of the pandemic.
Girls are dropping out and staying out of school at a higher rate than
boys. The female labor force participation rate has declined, with
women not only holding less secure jobs but also taking on more unpaid
work at home with childcare and housing.
Gender-based violence has increased to such an extent that UN Women,
the U.N. body charged with advancing the rights of women globally, now
warns of what they call a ``shadow pandemic'' of violence.
These are issues of great consequence to half of the world's
population. They cannot be an afterthought. Gender equity, equality,
and the empowerment of women and girls must be a focal point of U.S.
foreign policy, and that is exactly what the Ambassador at Large is
intended to facilitate.
Unfortunately, this position has been unfilled for too long. Over the
past 5 years, beginning in the Trump administration, the position of
the Ambassador at Large for Global Women's Issues has been filled for
only 1 year, so 20 percent of the time over the last 5 years.
During that time, we have endured an unprecedented global pandemic.
We have ended a 20-year war in Afghanistan. We have watched as Vladimir
Putin launched an unprovoked attack on Ukraine. We have experienced a
supply chain crisis and suffered a global food shortage. And in every
single one of these crises, women have been more acutely affected than
men and affected in a different way than men.
During the pandemic, women, who make up almost 70 percent of the
healthcare workforce, have been those who have been on the frontlines
of providing care for the sick and vulnerable.
With the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, women's rights have been
rolled back at an unprecedented rate, and we have seen--90 percent of
the households in Afghanistan have food insecurity, and women are
experiencing the greatest part of that.
Displacement from the war in Ukraine has left millions of women
vulnerable to human trafficking, even as Russia continues to shell
their homes and communities.
The food insecurity from the supply chain crisis and global food
shortage has reinforced our understanding of what we have seen for too
long: that in times of hunger, it is women who eat last and who eat the
least.
Through all of these crises, the Office of Global Women's Issues has
been without a leader to spearhead its work to ensure that women's
needs are incorporated in every aspect of the U.S. response to these
crises. Now, why does that matter? Well, not only do women make up 50
percent of the world's population, but what we know is that where women
are empowered, they contribute, give back more to their families. They
give back more to their communities. The countries that empower women
are more stable; they are more economically secure.
This is a policy that is important not only to our foreign policy
writ large but to our national security. That is why we need to fill
this position and why we urgently need to confirm Dr. Gupta.
Dr. Gupta has spent her career in service to gender equality and
women's empowerment. She knows better than most the impact that unfair
gender norms and inequalities have on women and the importance of
prioritizing women's leadership.
What is so unfortunate is that Dr. Gupta is being punished for her
personal views on women's reproductive choices. As the result of those
personal views, those groups who oppose women's reproductive choices
are spreading falsehoods instead of facts. They are doing that, and
unfortunately, too many of our colleagues on the other side of the
aisle have been willing to listen to those falsehoods without really
looking at the facts. This sets a very dangerous precedent for all
future nominees.
Let me be clear. The Office of Global Women's Issues does not lead on
sexual and reproductive health and rights, nor does it provide
information about abortion services.
When former President Trump nominated someone to lead the Office of
Global Women's Issues, I and my pro-choice colleagues in this body
didn't ask her what her position was on choice because we knew that was
not the mission of the Office of Global Women's Issues, and she was
confirmed. And I think by all accounts, people thought she did a good
job in the short time that she was there.
So why are my Republican colleagues spreading these falsehoods? They
have said that Dr. Gupta has advised the World Health Organization to
support abortion as a human right. They have alleged that Dr. Gupta
gave a speech saying that abortion should be an essential service. They
have alleged that the administration has plans to include abortion in
the mandate of the Office of Global Women's Issues. Let me be clear.
There is no truth behind those allegations.
If you missed it, let me say it again. There is no truth behind those
allegations.
We cannot let this idea that because somebody has a personal position
on an issue that affects them, that that means they cannot be
considered for a position within the government. You know, based on
that criteria, I wouldn't be able to be considered for any position.
So for the sake of Dr. Gupta's nomination today and for the sake of
all of those qualified women candidates who are going to come before
the Senate in the future, we can't let this divisive move become the
status quo. We have to correct the record. We need to approve Dr.
Gupta, and we need to get the Office of Global Women's Issues back
operating at full capacity.
With that, let me yield to my colleague from Hawaii, Senator Hirono.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Hawaii.
Ms. HIRONO. I rise today in support of Dr. Gita Rao Gupta's
nomination to serve as Ambassador at Large for Global Women's Issues,
and I am glad to be here with my friend from New Hampshire to argue for
her confirmation.
As head of the State Department's Office of Global Women's Issues,
the Ambassador at Large leads our diplomatic efforts to promote the
rights and empowerment of women and girls around the world. Who can
argue with that kind of a mission?
From supporting women's economic participation to combating domestic
and gender-based violence, this work is critically important, and Dr.
Gupta is well-suited to take on this important task. Dr. Gupta has
spent her life working to empower women across the globe. She has led
several nonprofit organizations focused on advancing gender equity and
has served as cochair of the World Bank's Gender-Based Violence Task
Force.
But for months now, Republicans have blocked consideration of her
nomination. Why? Not because she is unqualified. Dr. Gupta's record is
impeccable, and her qualifications are clear. No, Republicans are
blocking her nomination simply because she supports the fundamental
right of all women to make decisions about their bodies and their
futures, including the decision to get an abortion.
Apparently, it is no longer enough for my Republican colleagues to
push their extreme anti-abortion agenda. Now that they have overturned
Roe v. Wade, they are opposing anyone who expresses support for
abortion access even if it is their personal view and not one they are
going to be pushing forward in the position that we are being asked to
confirm them for.
Last year, the Republicans did the same thing to President Biden's
nominee to be Deputy Administrator of the Small Business
Administration, SBA, opposing his nomination because of their
opposition to SBA's totally lawful PPP loans to Planned Parenthood
clinics providing critical healthcare to communities across the
country.
The Republicans, I have to say, have been on a tear about ``How dare
SBA provide these lawful PPP loans to Planned Parenthood?'' Apparently,
it escapes their notice that these are lawful loans.
So Republicans' opposition to Dr. Gupta's confirmation is a dangerous
position and one that threatens the health, safety, and prosperity of
women here in the United States and around the world.
For example, my Republican colleagues raised concerns about the state
of women and girls in Afghanistan, and yet in another example of their
hypocrisy, they are opposing a nominee who would be in a position to
actually help support these women.
As Ambassador at Large for Global Women's Issues, Dr. Gupta will
bring
[[Page S4607]]
decades of experience to empower women, improve their economic
security, and end violence against women and girls.
There is no legitimate reason for anyone to not support her
nomination to this important role. The chaos and fear across the
country generated by the Supreme Court's Roe decision is spilling over
to block this nomination.
I thank Senator Shaheen for her focus on Dr. Gupta's nomination and
her dedication to women and girls at home and abroad, and I urge my
Republican colleagues to do the right thing for a change and end their
bad faith obstruction of Dr. Gupta's nomination.
I yield back to my colleague from New Hampshire.
Mrs. SHAHEEN. Thank you, Senator Hirono, and thank you for your
eloquent remarks about Dr. Gupta's qualifications and the importance of
having someone who has those kinds of qualifications at the Office of
Global Women's Issues.
At this time, I ask unanimous consent that notwithstanding rule XXII,
the Senate Foreign Relations Committee be discharged and the Senate
proceed to the following nomination: PN1578, Geeta Rao Gupta, to be
Ambassador at Large for Global Women's Issues; that the Senate vote on
the nomination with no intervening action or debate; that the motion to
reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table; that no further
motions be in order to the nomination; and that any related statements
be printed in the Record.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
Mr. HAGERTY. Reserving the right to object.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Tennessee.
Mr. HAGERTY. Dr. Gupta received a tie vote in the Senate Foreign
Relations Committee. There is a Senate process that has been agreed to
by both parties by which the leader can discharge a nomination with a
tie vote from this committee to bring it before the full Senate, if he
so chooses.
I am saying this as a person who has been put through 30 hours of
cloture himself when I served in the executive branch and went through
this very process.
We should not break from Senate process and procedure with regard to
Dr. Gupta's nomination. Members should have the opportunity to vote,
and the majority leader can schedule it.
Additionally, I think the vast majority of Senators from both sides
value the economic empowerment of women everywhere around the globe.
The previous administration made economic empowerment for women
worldwide one of its signature initiatives.
I served as a diplomat at that time in the previous administration,
and the senior Senator from New Hampshire was a valuable partner in
many of our efforts, which I very much appreciate.
So I think that there is a goal we share, but there are valid
concerns on our side that the current administration is tainting this
worthy goal and dismantling the bipartisan achievements of the previous
administration. We deserve to have a better understanding of what this
administration is doing before we rush ahead and totally bypass the
Senate Foreign Relations Committee to confirm the person who will be
the chief implementer of this administration's policies.
I am not comfortable giving consent to expedite consideration of this
nominee.
Therefore, I object.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Objection is heard.
The Senator from New Hampshire.
Mrs. SHAHEEN. Madam President, I can buy that answer. Senator Hagerty
and I have worked together on the Foreign Relations Committee. I voted
for you to be an Ambassador. I thought you did a good job in that role,
and I think you are doing a good job now.
But the fact is that taking up floor time to deal with qualified
nominees at a time when we have limited floor time, when we have a
position that needs to be filled, when we have a minority position on
the Foreign Relations Committee in opposition to authorizing
permanently the Office of Global Women's Issues tells me it is
something more than that, and I think Dr. Gupta's stalled nomination is
emblematic of the intransigence on confirming President Biden's
nominees for the Department of State.
That obstructionism is undermining our diplomatic efforts. It is
demoralizing to employees at the Department of State who have dedicated
their lives to U.S. foreign policy, and I know you understand that
because you headed an Embassy. You know how critical our employees are
who manage our foreign policy.
Eric Rubin, a former Ambassador to Bulgaria, recently spelled out
what this means for U.S. diplomacy and national security, and this is
the concern that we all ought to have.
Madam President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the
Record this article from Puck News.
There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in
the Record, as follows:
[Sept. 6, 2022]
Washington's New Crisis of Diplomacy
(By Julia Ioffe)
As of this writing, it has been 593 days since an American
ambassador has inhabited the Villa Taverna, their official
residence in Rome. Ever since the financier and Republican
donor Lewis Eisenberg moved out at the end of Donald Trump's
administration on January 21, 2021, no one has replaced him.
President Joe Biden never nominated anyone, which raised
eyebrows both in American foreign policy circles and in
Italy. The Romans I've spoken to are furious and see it as a
sign of unprecedented disrespect, especially at a time when
Washington is asking its European allies--including countries
dependent on Russian gas, like Italy--to hold the line on
anti-Russian sanctions. ``It's the only G7 country with no
U.S. ambassador,'' one American diplomatic insider told me.
``I know the Italians are unhappy and they should be, given
the situation politically and what's going on with Russia.''
Given that Russia is rumored to have had a hand in the
collapse of Mario Draghi's sanctions-friendly coalition
government this summer, the fact that Washington doesn't have
a representative on the ground is more than embarrassing.
It's downright negligent.
Currently, the United States is represented in Italy by
Shawn Crowley, who is the charge d'affaires. That's fine, but
a charge doesn't have the same rank and status as an
ambassador, and receiving countries have all kinds of
protocols and rules about who can meet with whom. Usually, a
charge has a much lower ceiling for whom they can meet than
an ambassador; the rank itself can be quite limiting. ``The
Italians,'' noted the diplomatic insider, ``are very protocol
conscious.'' As are the Ukrainians--so much so that, despite
all the aid the U.S. has poured into his country, President
Volodymyr Zelensky refused to meet with the American charge
d'affaires until a real American ambassador, Bridget Brink,
arrived in Kyiv this May.
Why has Biden left the post in Rome unfilled for so long?
It's been an open secret in Washington that the president is
holding the spot for Nancy Pelosi, the first Italian-American
Speaker of the House and a minor celebrity in Italy. The
idea, apparently, was to give her a nice, cushy retirement
gig after Republicans take over the House. But why not
nominate someone, like a career foreign service officer, to
serve in the post, and then shoo them out once Pelosi ripens
to the idea? All ambassadors, after all, serve at the
pleasure of the president. I asked spokespeople at both the
State Department and the White House about this, but they
wouldn't--and couldn't--explain to me, even off the record,
what the hell is going on there, not even after Fox News
published its own story about the Pelosi rumors on Tuesday.
Pelosi's people, meanwhile, offered a familiar line: Why
would Pelosi go get another job when she could just retire to
Napa, and play with her grandkids? ``Fox is just trying to
start shit,'' one source close to the speaker told me.
``There are no conversations with the White House. And I've
just heard [Pelosi] say `S.F. is heaven on earth' one too
many times to believe that she would realistically want to
spend her post-Speaker life anywhere but home with family.''
Which is also the exact kind of thing you might say before
you take a job like that.
The Italian imbroglio is just the tip of the diplomatic
iceberg. Over a year and a half into Biden's administration,
more than 20 percent of American ambassadorships remain
unfilled. Nearly 40 of them have a nominee that is pending
confirmation, including for strategically vital posts, like
the Czech Republic, Latvia, and the Netherlands--all crucial
allies in holding the line against Russia on Ukraine. There
is no American ambassador in Saudi Arabia, a fraught but
important ally, and there hasn't been one since Biden's
inauguration. India, the world's largest democracy, hasn't
had an American ambassador since then either. The current
nominee, L.A. mayor Eric Garcetti, has been in confirmation
purgatory for more than a year, held up over allegations that
he knew about his chief of staff's alleged sexual predations.
In limbo, too, is the nomination for the ambassador to the
U.N.'s Conference on Disarmament. Apparently, the U.S. Senate
does not consider nuclear disarmament a pressing matter.
Fifteen more posts are completely vacant, with no nominee
anywhere in sight. The abandonment of some places, like Cuba
and
[[Page S4608]]
Afghanistan, make some sense. Other places, like Ethiopia, or
Estonia, which is a crucial NATO ally, do not. ``There is no
reasonable explanation for why more than 20 percent of our
ambassadorships overseas remain unfilled,'' said Eric Rubin,
president of the American Foreign Service Association, which
tracks such things. ``This is not a world in which we can
coast and assume that the rest of the world will wait for us
to sort out our parochial difficulties. No other country
leaves key diplomatic posts vacant so frequently and for so
long.''
The problem, though, is that there is an explanation. In
fact, there are several. It began with Trump gutting the
State Department and the career foreign service. The people
he had nominated to represent the United States were
comically unqualified if not outright problematic. Once Biden
came in, Washington expected him to right the ship. He had
been, after all, an old member of the Senate Foreign
Relations Committee and a vice president that had handled
some of the most complex foreign policy matters under
President Barack Obama. He boasted about his foreign policy
chops as well as the coterie of smart, experienced advisors
he was bringing in with him: the best and the brightest.
And yet, here we are, more than a year and a half later,
and one-fifth of the president's ambassadors remain
unconfirmed or even unnominated. The first problem for Biden
was the Presidential Personnel Office, which, in true
Democratic fashion, decided that if the previous
administration was going to nominate people with criminal
records or ongoing lawsuits for ambassadorships, they were
going to do things with extra diligence. Chief of staff Ron
Klain also decided he had to vet every single nominee, too,
slowing the process even further. Meanwhile, over in Foggy
Bottom, the State Department decided that its people also
had to be extra vetted by diplomatic security, because
everyone now had a digital footprint and social media
presence.
Then, last July, Texas Senator Ted Cruz took it upon
himself to wage a one-man campaign to kill the Nord Stream II
project by putting a blanket hold on all the Biden
administration's State Department nominees unless the White
House got the German government to kill its pipeline. Since
the Biden administration was not about to do so, this created
a massive backlog--and that was before Missouri's Josh Hawley
instituted his own blanket hold, in September 2021, on State
and Defense Department nominees unless Secretary of State
Antony Blinken, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, and National
Security Advisor Jake Sullivan resigned for, in his view,
bungling the withdrawal from Afghanistan.
Needless to say that never happened. By the time these
holds were lifted early this year, the backlog had grown
massive. And time on the floor of the Senate of the 117th
Congress, which will gavel out on January 3, 2023, had grown
ever more precious.
But before that, let's pause to talk about how
ambassadorial nominees get to the floor of the Senate for a
vote.
First, they have to be approved by the Senate Foreign
Relations Committee, which is currently headed by New
Jersey's Bob Menendez, a Democrat, and Idaho's Jim Risch, a
Republican. Both men are steeped in foreign affairs and
appear to all outside observers as serious thinkers about
world events. But according to people who have regular
dealings with the Foreign Relations Committee, they have a
relationship that is closer to something out of Mean Girls.
They are, as one source familiar with the committee described
them to me, ``like oil and water.'' They have been known to
be so laser-focused on messing with each other, in fact, that
they regularly inhibit the functioning of the Committee. Said
one Senate staffer familiar with the workings of the
Committee, ``It's an open secret that the challenges in their
working relationship often impedes us from working together
constructively on foreign policy and national security
issues.''
But there are other issues for ambassadorial nominees to
navigate inside the Committee, especially if they're female.
There is only one woman senator on the committee, New
Hampshire's Jeanne Shaheen, and so the women Biden has
nominated often run up against the proclivities of the old
men of the Senate, especially of the Republican persuasion.
``There is certainly a layer of unconscious bias that is
holding back a number of women, that isn't there for the male
nominees,'' said the Senate staffer. This includes ``spouses
saying things about Trump'' or ``the way in which women talk
and represent themselves, where Republicans have been
viscerally opposed to just how the women communicate.''
According to two sources, Sarah Margon, who had run the
Washington office of Human Rights Watch and was nominated to
lead the State Department's Office of Democracy, Human
Rights, and Labor, ran into trouble when she met with Senator
Risch, who pressed her repeatedly on her position on the BDS
movement. She opposed it, she said repeatedly. Afterwards,
Risch told colleagues he didn't like Margon's tone. (A
committee spokesperson contended that, ``The issue was not
and has never been her `tone,' it was her answers to the
questions themselves.'' The spokesperson did not, however,
explain what was wrong with the answers.)
Other women have been pressed by Committee Republicans on
their stances on abortion, even if the position they are
nominated for has nothing to do with women's health, let
alone abortion. This happened, for example, with Dr. Geeta
Gupta, who was nominated to be the Ambassador to the Office
of Global Women's Issues. The post, and the office, deals
with women's security and economic empowerment, and has
nothing to do with women's health, let alone reproductive
rights. Yet Gupta was held up by Republicans on the Foreign
Relations Committee over her alleged support of abortion,
sending Shaheen into a righteous fury. ``Republican
grandstanding that held Geeta Gupta's nomination from
advancing in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in July
is a pivotal example of this gross display of partisan
politics,'' Shaheen said in an email. ``Republicans prevented
her nomination from proceeding to fill the urgently needed
role as Ambassador at Large for Global Women's Issues because
of their obsession over women's health and access to
abortion--neither of which are under the jurisdiction of this
role. Senate Republicans are putting our security in danger
and our credibility on the world stage at risk--it needs to
end now.''
The guiding assumption seems to be that if they are women
and Democrats, then they are automatically rabid abortionists
and will use whatever diplomatic role to advocate for it,
from Kyiv to Kinshasa. ``Women nominees tend to face more
rigor from Senate Republicans and are frequently questioned
about extraneous issues like their views on abortion,''
another Senate Democratic aide told me. ``Some of this
happens in public during hearings, but the majority of times
it takes place behind closed doors when there are no cameras
around to catch a senator and his staff go after women over
issues well beyond the scope of the position for which they
were nominated.''
Once upon a time, ambassadorial nominees could count on
cruising through the Senate on a vote of unanimous consent.
They would be advanced as a block of nominees and voted
through as a block, and people would only get singled out if
they had truly bungled their meetings with senators. The
feeling at the time was that the President of the United
States deserved to pick his ambassadors just as he deserved
to pick his cabinet secretaries and the Senate was there only
to weed out the truly rotten apples.
No more. If a nominee even makes it out of committee for a
floor vote, they are voted on individually, it takes several
hours, and any senator can use the opportunity of their
nomination to extract something from the administration.
Some, like Hawley, have asked for the resignation of cabinet
secretaries. Others have asked for small, stupid things like,
for example, a visa for a friend in exchange for waving a
nomination through. That is to be expected of Republicans who
will do whatever they can to impede Biden's agenda, but even
some Democrats have caught on to the game. They have also
learned that they can use any nomination to extract some
choice morsel from the administration, whether it's a pet
issue or something they can flaunt to constituents back
home.
As a result, every single State Department confirmation
hearing, ambassadorial or otherwise, now resembles a hostage
negotiation. ``This is not how the system is supposed to
work,'' said one insider the process. ``You're not supposed
to negotiate for individual unrelated reasons. But people
have started treating this as normal. I think nominations
will look like this forever from now on.''
Because of this, and because there are only four working
weeks left on the Senate calendar before the midterms,
Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has made it crystal clear to
his conference that ambassadorial nominees are now at the
very back of the line. Why spend hours on the ambassador to
Azerbaijan when you can ram through another lifetime judicial
appointment to balance out the work done by Mitch McConnell
when he had the majority? ``You only have a certain number of
hours a week,'' one Senate aide familiar with the process
told me. ``The more we're spending it on ambassadorial
nominations, the less we're spending it on judges.'' Added a
Senate Democratic staffer, ``It has been made clear that,
through the midterms, the floor will be tied up with judicial
nominees.''
After the midterms, whether the Democrats hold the Senate
or not, it will be a new, 118th Congress and that means all
the ambassadorial nominations now floundering in senatorial
purgatory will have to be resubmitted, and the process will
begin again, from scratch.
Both the White House and State, in their official
statements to me, emphasized the number of ambassadors they
were able to confirm, despite the unprecedented obstruction
they're facing in the Senate. Things are actually going
pretty well, they say, all things considered. But privately,
the tone is very different. People worry about recruiting and
retention. Who in their right mind would want to go through a
process like this? Others worry about the irreparable harm
this is doing to our relationships with allies and
adversaries abroad, especially after the calamity that was
the Trump presidency.
``It's baffling to our foreign interlocutors because they
don't have these confirmation processes, and our inability to
field ambassadors when there are so many crises around the
world is unbelievable to them,'' one former State Department
official told me. ``It's also having a huge impact at State
on morale and retention. I think because there's so much
uncertainty over how long it takes to get confirmed, the
currency of an ambassadorship is being devalued. You have
people
[[Page S4609]]
waiting for a year or more to get confirmed. People have quit
jobs for these posts. Others are waiting inside State, stuck
in limbo forever. I heard of someone who considered retiring
while waiting to be confirmed.''
Eric Rubin, himself a former ambassador to Bulgaria and
deputy chief of mission in Russia, is worried about what
message this is sending to the two countries most eager to
weaken and replace America on the world stage: Russia and
China. ``The U.S. no longer has the largest diplomatic
service, China does,'' Rubin told me. ``The U.S. no longer
has the most embassies and consulates abroad, China does. We
have to stop tying one hand behind our backs in our efforts
to represent our country and advance its security and
prosperity.''
Or, in the words of the diplomatic insider, ``It's
malpractice.''
Mrs. SHAHEEN. Ambassador Rubin put it very starkly. He said:
The U.S. no longer has the largest diplomatic service.
China does.
He concluded by saying:
We have to stop tying one hand behind our backs in our
efforts to represent our country and advance its security and
prosperity.
It's malpractice.
It is malpractice.
The fact that too many people in this Chamber are dragging their feet
on allowing Ambassadors to be confirmed, on allowing diplomats with the
Department of State to be confirmed, on allowing other high level
people throughout government to be confirmed because, only, of their
opposition to the Biden administration is just untenable, and it is
against our national security.
So I think it is time now for the Senate to do its job to confirm Dr.
Gupta. So let's move forward. Let's get our foreign policy with respect
to gender throughout the world back on track.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Tennessee.
Mr. HAGERTY. Madam President, I have great respect for my colleague
from New Hampshire. I worked very hard on the WGDP initiative that was
put in place by the previous administration. It has the potential to do
so much good.
I am very concerned about elements of that being dismantled right
now, and I would like to remind my colleagues on the other side of the
aisle that this is a matter of priorities.
Again, I will reiterate that I was put through 30 hours of cloture.
The rules have been improved since then to reduce that amount of time.
I think it would be a total of 4 hours in this case, yet the priorities
set by the leadership of the other side indicate that they don't care
as much about these positions because they won't even schedule it.
It is certainly within the Senate majority leader's power to do that.
Rather, the Senate majority leader would rather prioritize seating the
Postal Board of Governors than putting Ambassadors into place.
So I have difficulty with this argument, and, with all due respect,
my objection stands.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Alaska.