[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 158 (2012), Part 3]
[Senate]
[Page 3363]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                          JUDICIAL NOMINATIONS

  Mr. REID. Mr. President, yesterday I filed cloture on 17 consensus 
judicial nominations. I have worked with the Republicans for months to 
find a way forward for a timely confirmation for many of these 
nominees, including some who have been waiting for up-or-down votes 
since October. Yesterday I had a visual aid--and I will show it during 
the caucus today--to show what happened in the Clinton years, the Bush 
years, and the Obama years. It is so clear what has happened. And it 
really doesn't fully represent what happened because in the Clinton 
years we had dozens and dozens of nominees who were what we called 
pocket-vetoed--they just wouldn't hold hearings on them. But with the 
length of time the judges were reported out of committee--Clinton, a 
few days; Bush, a few days; and, of course, now we are talking about 
many months with the Obama nominations--that is not fair. They should 
all be entitled to an up-or-down vote, especially when they came out of 
the committee so overwhelmingly, with rare exception. There is no 
reason we should eat up even 1 day of precious time the Senate has to 
pass these commonsense measures when we can do it so quickly.
  President Obama's judicial nominees have waited five or six times 
longer than President Bush's nominations for confirmation, and that 
time has increased and is not going down. The Senate once confirmed 18 
of President Bush's nominations in a single day. There is no 
justification for obstruction on matters that ought to be routine. 
There is too much to do. The Senate simply doesn't have the luxury to 
waste any more time.

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