[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 147 (2001), Part 11]
[Senate]
[Pages 15331-15332]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                              NOMINATIONS

  Mr. LEAHY. Madam President, I thank the Senate for moving 
expeditiously on the Hutchinson nomination. I note that on Monday and 
Tuesday of this week the Judiciary Committee followed through on its 
confirmation hearing for Robert Mueller III, the President's nominee to 
be Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. I mention this 
because this was the fifth confirmation hearing the Judiciary Committee 
held in July for judicial and executive branch nominees, which is 
pretty good because we were not allowed, under the reorganization, to 
have Members assigned to our committee until July 10.
  In fact, I cannot think of any time in the last 6 years where the 
Judiciary Committee held five confirmation hearings in 3 weeks. Two of 
those hearings involved judicial nominees to the Courts of Appeals.
  I appreciate the fact that the Senator from Montana, Mr. Baucus, 
noted that we held the hearing on the two district court nominees for 
Montana ``in a very expeditious fashion.'' It was gracious of Senator 
Hutchinson to offer his thanks for our scheduling the confirmation 
hearing of Asa Hutchinson to be head of the DEA ``so expeditiously'' 
after Senate reorganization. I appreciate William Riley, the nominee to 
the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals, thanking the Judiciary Committee 
for ``holding a prompt hearing.'' It was gratifying when Senator 
Cochran noted that he was ``very pleased with the dispatch'' with which 
we held a hearing on the nomination of Jim Ziglar to head the INS. And 
this week, Mr. Mueller thanked us for holding his hearing as quickly as 
we did.
  With respect to executive branch nominees, considering the fact that 
the committee has only been able to hold hearings for 3 weeks, our work 
period has been outstanding. We held back-to-back days of hearings for 
the President's nominees to head the Drug Enforcement Administration 
and the Immigration and Naturalization Service 2 weeks ago, and 2 days 
of hearings on the nominee to head the FBI this week. In addition, we 
have held hearings on the Assistant Attorney General to head the Tax 
Division, the Assistant Attorney General to head the Office of Justice 
Programs, and the Director of the National Institute of Justice--all in 
July.
  We would have done more if we had been allowed to do this, of course, 
during the month of June. So the Senate

[[Page 15332]]

has considered and confirmed the Attorney General, the Deputy Attorney 
General, the Solicitor General, the Assistant Attorney General in 
charge of the Criminal Division, the Assistant Attorney General in 
charge of the Civil Rights Division, the Assistant Attorney General in 
charge of the Antitrust Division, the Assistant Attorney General in 
charge of the Office of Legislative Affairs, the Assistant Attorney 
General in charge of Policy Development, and other key officials within 
the Department of Justice, as well as the Commissioner of the INS and, 
today, the Administrator of the Drug Enforcement Administration.
  I hope we can move very quickly on the Director of the FBI.
  We have not received the nomination yet for the No. 3 job at the 
Department of Justice, the Associate Attorney General. We have not yet 
received the nomination of someone to head the U.S. Marshals Service. 
Even though we are about to go into an August recess, we have not 
received a single nomination for any of the 94 U.S. marshals who serve 
in districts within our States. We have only received a handful of 
nominations for the 93 U.S. attorney positions that are in districts 
within our States.
  So there is a lot to be done. And it will be done if we work 
together, and not if we have people come and give statements on the 
floor, or elsewhere, that are not factual because, unfortunately, as 
somebody once said, those pesky little facts get in the way. And these 
are the facts. There is no time, in the 25 years I have been in the 
Senate Judiciary Committee, that I have seen so many nominees move in a 
3-week period in the middle of the year.
  Madam President, I yield the floor.

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