[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 159 (2013), Part 6]
[Senate]
[Pages 7612-7613]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                              NOMINATIONS

  Mr. McCONNELL. Mr. President, according to the Congressional Research 
Service, President Obama has had his Cabinet nominees confirmed quicker 
than his predecessors during the same period in the second term--
quicker.
  I don't know what the majority leader thinks advise and consent 
means. Listening to him it means: Sit down, shut up, don't ask any 
questions, and confirm immediately. I don't think that is what the 
Founding Fathers had in mind.
  Talk about manufacturing a problem--the Secretary of Energy, 97 to 0; 
the Secretary of Interior, 87 to 11; Secretary of the Treasury, 71 to 
26; Office of Management and Budget, 96 to 0; Secretary of State, 94 to 
3--in 7 days.
  What we have just heard, I am afraid for my good friend the majority 
leader, in spite of the baseball analogy--and I read in the papers this 
morning he has been meeting with his members and trying to get 51 votes 
to blow the Senate up.
  We have important issues coming down the pike. We want to finish the 
farm bill. We have been working hard to develop a broad bipartisan 
support for an immigration bill. We know what is going on here. What I 
fear is that the majority leader is working his way toward breaking his 
word to the Senate and to the American people, blowing up this 
institution, and making it extremely difficult for us to operate on the 
collegial basis we have operated on for over 200 years.
  He wants to have no debate. Do what I say and do it now. This is the 
culture of intimidation we have seen at the IRS, HHS, FCC, SEC, and now 
here at the Senate: Do what I say when I say it. Sit down and shut up 
or we will change the rules. We will break the rules to change the 
rules.
  We need to think over how we conduct ourselves in this body. The 
majority leader has a very important position. It is not only to lead 
the party of the majority, it is also to protect the institution. What 
I hear lacking in that speech is any interest whatsoever in protecting 
the traditions of this institution. What I hear is: We are going to get 
our way as rapidly as possible. You guys and gals, sit down and shut 
up. Don't ask too many questions; don't make it take a week longer. Do 
what we say, and if you don't, we will break the rules to change the 
rules. That is what this is about.
  I want to make sure everybody understands where the majority leader 
is taking us. Make no mistake about it, the American people have given 
us divided government, but that doesn't mean they expect us not to 
accomplish things. We are on the cusp of beginning an extremely 
important debate about the future of the country after the recess, but 
we know what is going on. What I hear is the majority leader does not 
want to keep his word to the Senate or to the American people. We will 
take that into consideration as we move forward.
  With regard to this D.C. Circuit nomination--talk about a 
manufactured crisis. This well-qualified nominee came out of the 
committee unanimously. We have been operating on confirming judges on 
the basis of coming out of committee. So the majority leader decided 
that wasn't good enough and to do it now.
  Yesterday I objected to that simply because--we did not have a 
problem here. We have been operating in a very collegial and sensible 
way. However, he has now manufactured something he can call a 
filibuster by filing cloture on a nominee we were prepared to confirm 
in an up-or-down vote in a week from now. So we ought to confirm him 
now.

[[Page 7613]]

  Therefore, as I noted yesterday, Senate Republicans don't have a 
problem with an up-or-down vote on this pending nominee for the D.C. 
Circuit. Indeed, the day after his nomination appeared on the Executive 
Calendar for the first time, we offered to have an up-or-down vote on 
the nomination. The only thing we asked was that Members who did not 
serve on the Judiciary Committee have at least a reasonable amount of 
time to review his record. Unfortunately, the majority would not take 
yes for an answer.
  Instead, it moved to set a 60-vote hurdle by filing cloture on the 
nomination the day after it first appeared on the calendar. It was 
heavyhanded, and, frankly, completely mystifying. As I said, the 
nomination had been on the Executive Calendar for barely a day, but we 
are not going to let the majority leader manufacture an obstruction 
crisis where none exists.

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