[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 162 (2016), Part 2]
[Senate]
[Pages 1813-1814]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                           EXECUTIVE SESSION

                                 ______
                                 

                           EXECUTIVE CALENDAR

  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Under the previous order, the Senate will 
proceed to executive session to consider the following nomination, 
which the clerk will report.
  The legislative clerk read the nomination of Leonard Terry Strand, of 
South Dakota, to be United States District Judge for the Northern 
District of Iowa.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. There will now be 15 minutes of debate, 
equally divided in the usual form.
  Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, today, as was just reported, we will 
vote on the nomination of Len Strand from Iowa. I am very pleased to be 
here to support him, just as I was here a few days ago to support Judge 
Ebinger from Iowa, who was unanimously confirmed by the U.S. Senate on 
Monday, and I hope this person will likewise be unanimously approved.
  I said this on the floor earlier this week, but for the benefit of my 
colleagues who didn't get a chance to hear that wonderful speech I 
gave, in my opinion, the Iowa nominees, Judge Ebinger and now Judge 
Strand, are the two best judicial candidates this President has 
nominated. Earlier this week I discussed the extensive selection 
process these nominees underwent. I will not go into those details 
again, but I will say that I am very pleased the process produced such 
a nominee as Judge Strand.
  Judge Strand has deep Iowa roots. He received his undergraduate 
degree from the University of Iowa in 1987 and his law degree from the 
University of Iowa College of Law in 1990. Upon graduation, he joined 
one of the most prestigious law firms in Iowa as an associate, where he 
specialized in employment law and commercial litigation.
  During his time at the law firm, he received several awards, 
including ``Super Lawyer'' for Iowa and the Great Plains region for 6 
years straight. During his time at the firm, he was very involved in 
his community. He has been a member of a wide range of organizations 
important to Iowa, all the way from the symphony orchestra, to the 
medical center, to the YMCA.
  In 2012 Judge Strand was appointed as a magistrate judge for the U.S. 
District Court for the Northern District of Iowa. In this capacity, he 
has handled hundreds of cases, which has prepared him well to be a 
Federal district judge, article III.
  The ABA considers him--as you know the classifications--``unanimously 
well qualified'' for this position.
  As I did Monday for Judge Ebinger, I urge all my colleagues to 
support his nomination today, and we will be voting on it shortly.
  Mr. LEAHY. Mr. President, today we will vote on the nomination of 
Leonard Strand to fill a judicial emergency vacancy in the Federal 
district court in the Northern District of Iowa. I will vote to support 
his nomination.
  The next district court nominee pending after we return from the 
President's Day recess will be Waverly Crenshaw, an exceptional 
African-American nominee who is nominated to a judicial emergency 
vacancy in the Middle District of Tennessee. Mr. Crenshaw has the 
support of his Republican home State Senators, Senators Alexander and 
Corker, and he was voice voted out of the Judiciary Committee last 
July. There is no reason to continue to delay the confirmation of such 
a qualified nominee who is urgently needed for Tennesseans to receive 
swift justice. I hope the Senators from Tennessee can convince their 
majority leader to schedule a vote for Mr. Crenshaw as soon as we 
return from recess. I further hope that the majority leader will 
continue to regularly schedule judicial confirmation votes to ensure 
that our Federal judiciary is fully functioning.
  Since Republicans took over the majority last January, they have 
allowed votes on just 15 nominees. In stark contrast, at this point in 
the last 2 years of the Bush Presidency in 2008, when Senate Democrats 
were in the majority, we had confirmed 40 judicial nominees. Senate 
Republicans' obstruction has resulted in judicial vacancies soaring 
across the country--rising by more than 75 percent. Judicial vacancies 
deemed to be ``emergencies'' by the Administrative Office of the U.S. 
Courts because caseloads in those courts are unmanageably high has 
nearly tripled in that time. Senate Democrats worked hard to reduce 
these judicial emergency vacancies to 12, but under Republican 
leadership, they have now risen to 32. There is an urgent need for the 
Senate to confirm highly qualified nominees who will get to work in 
Federal courthouses across the country where justice for too many 
Americans has been delayed. Judge Strand will fill just one of these 
emergency vacancies. There are dozens more to fill.
  Judge Strand is an excellent judicial nominee who has served in our 
Federal judiciary since 2012 as a U.S. magistrate judge in the district 
court for the Northern District of Iowa. Prior to joining the bench, he 
spent over 20 years in private practice as a partner at the Cedar 
Rapids, IA, law firm Simmons Perrine Moyer Bergman PLC. The ABA 
Standing Committee on the Federal Judiciary unanimously rated

[[Page 1814]]

Judge Strand ``Well Qualified'' to serve on the Federal district court, 
its highest possible rating. He has the strong support of his home 
State Senators, Chairman Grassley of the Judiciary Committee and 
Senator Ernst.
  After today, 17 judicial nominees will remain pending on the Senate 
floor. These nominees are from Tennessee, Maryland, New Jersey, 
Nebraska, New York, California, Rhode Island, and Pennsylvania. Many of 
these nominees will fill emergency vacancies, and nearly half of these 
nominees have Republican home State Senator support. Furthermore, there 
are another 15 judicial nominees pending in the Judiciary Committee 
from California, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Louisiana, 
Maryland, Massachusetts, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Utah, and Wisconsin.
  It is our constitutional duty as Senators to provide advice and 
consent on these judicial nominees. The Federal judiciary is dependent 
on us to fulfill this obligation, and the American people expect that 
we will do the jobs we have been elected to do in the U.S. Senate. This 
is why the demand from certain moneyed Washington interest groups that 
Republican Senators oppose the confirmation of any judicial nominee 
this year, regardless of a nominee's merit or qualifications, is so 
destructive. Not only would this require Senators to cede their role 
and judgement to outside political action committees, but refusing to 
confirm any judicial nominees for the rest of this year would also make 
the high number of vacancies in our Federal judiciary even worse. This 
would hurt the American people and weaken our justice system. We cannot 
allow this to happen.
  In the first 5 weeks of this year, the Senate has voted on five 
judicial nominees. During this time, we have also debated and voted on 
legislation and confirmed executive nominees. There is no reason why 
the Republican majority cannot continue to hold confirmation votes on 
judicial nominees when we return. In 2008, when I was chairman of the 
committee with a Republican President, we worked to confirm judicial 
nominees as late as September of the Presidential election year. In 
fact, that year Senate Democrats confirmed 28 of President Bush's 
judicial nominees, 22 of these in the last 7 months of 2008. This 
includes the confirmation of 10 of President Bush's district court 
nominees pending on the Senate floor in a single day by unanimous 
consent on September 26, 2008.
  I urge my fellow Senators to vote to confirm Judge Strand and look 
forward to continuing to work with my fellow Senators to ensure that we 
continue to vote on the remaining pending judicial nominees when we 
return from recess.
  Mr. GRASSLEY. I yield back all time on this side, Mr. President.
  I yield the floor.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The question is, Will the Senate advise and 
consent to the Strand nomination?
  Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I ask for the yeas and nays.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there a sufficient second?
  There appears to be a sufficient second.
  The clerk will call the roll.
  The legislative clerk called the roll.
  Mr. CORNYN. The following Senators are necessarily absent: the 
Senator from Texas (Mr. Cruz), the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. 
Graham), the Senator from Kansas (Mr. Moran), the Senator from Florida 
(Mr. Rubio), and the Senator from Alaska (Mr. Sullivan).
  Mr. DURBIN. I announce that the Senator from California (Mrs. Boxer) 
and the Senator from Vermont (Mr. Sanders) are necessarily absent.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Hoeven). Are there any other Senators in 
the Chamber desiring to vote?
  The result was announced--yeas 93, nays 0, as follows:

                       [Rollcall Vote No. 23 Ex.]

                                YEAS--93

     Alexander
     Ayotte
     Baldwin
     Barrasso
     Bennet
     Blumenthal
     Blunt
     Booker
     Boozman
     Brown
     Burr
     Cantwell
     Capito
     Cardin
     Carper
     Casey
     Cassidy
     Coats
     Cochran
     Collins
     Coons
     Corker
     Cornyn
     Cotton
     Crapo
     Daines
     Donnelly
     Durbin
     Enzi
     Ernst
     Feinstein
     Fischer
     Flake
     Franken
     Gardner
     Gillibrand
     Grassley
     Hatch
     Heinrich
     Heitkamp
     Heller
     Hirono
     Hoeven
     Inhofe
     Isakson
     Johnson
     Kaine
     King
     Kirk
     Klobuchar
     Lankford
     Leahy
     Lee
     Manchin
     Markey
     McCain
     McCaskill
     McConnell
     Menendez
     Merkley
     Mikulski
     Murkowski
     Murphy
     Murray
     Nelson
     Paul
     Perdue
     Peters
     Portman
     Reed
     Reid
     Risch
     Roberts
     Rounds
     Sasse
     Schatz
     Schumer
     Scott
     Sessions
     Shaheen
     Shelby
     Stabenow
     Tester
     Thune
     Tillis
     Toomey
     Udall
     Vitter
     Warner
     Warren
     Whitehouse
     Wicker
     Wyden

                             NOT VOTING--7

     Boxer
     Cruz
     Graham
     Moran
     Rubio
     Sanders
     Sullivan
  The nomination was confirmed.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Iowa.
  Mr. GRASSLEY. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the motion 
to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
  Under the previous order, the President will be immediately notified 
of the Senate's action.

                          ____________________