Executive Nominations

Floor Speech

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Mr. BENNET. Mr. President, I rise to call on the Senate to do something the rest of the American people are doing, our job. Most of President Obama's nominees to the executive branch and our Federal courts are not even remotely controversial. The country needs them on the job, and their responsibilities, their careers, and the stress on their families should not be caused by holds and other pointless delays.

We face serious challenges as a nation. Unemployment and underemployment rates are unacceptably high. Our courts have unprecedented backlogs. We are fighting two wars and have the persistent threat of terror that casts a shadow over our security.

We need a functioning Federal Government. The American people expect this. Yet some in this body are too tied up in ``politics as usual'' to get our government working again. Rather than making sure we get the government up and running by allowing our votes on key administration nominees, the Senate is mired in perpetual stalling, failing to perform its constitutional responsibility to advise and consent. Qualified people nominated to hold key positions in the administration are languishing in the Senate because of procedural abuses. These should end.

I have introduced a resolution which would help address some of these abuses. My resolution would bring holds by one Senator outside the shadows, time limit them, and place requirements that, after 2 days, holds must be bipartisan to continue.

These commonsense improvements ought not be necessary. But in today's Senate, unfortunately, they are. I fully support scrutinizing all positions requiring confirmation. In fact, that is why my suggested resolution actually says, if you have bipartisan support--and there might be a reason to look at it other than just pure politics--I think we should look at it.

But useless delay is not getting us anywhere. I am not asking for a rubberstamp from anyone. But a desire to assert leverage over the administration or a desire to frustrate the government's efforts to work for the American people is unacceptable for holding up nominees.

Too often we have seen nominees held for months only to be confirmed by overwhelming margins. Judge Barbara Keenan was recently confirmed to the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals by the breathtakingly close vote of 99 to 0. This was after her nomination was held up for 4 months following approval by the Judiciary Committee.

There are currently 16 other judicial nominees who, similar to Judge Keenan, have cleared the Senate Judiciary Committee and are awaiting floor time. Unfortunately, they are subject to partisan and meritless delays. The result is, our district and appellate courts will continue to be backlogged and justice will not be served in communities all across the United States of America.

Judicial nominations have a sad history of partisanship in recent years. The delays and games that have replaced the Senate's role to advise and consent have now bled into all executive branch nominations at unprecedented levels.

Just last month, the media reported 80 nominees were being held up by one Senator. These holds included the Under Secretary for Military Readiness and top officials at the Departments of State and Homeland Security. These holds were unrelated to the actual nominee and solely concerned parochial and political interests. Our national security should never be subjugated to one Senator's politics.

We also had the President's nomination to the Transportation Security Administration tied up and ultimately withdrawn because of partisan bickering unrelated to his responsibilities to secure our airports. This is unacceptable. Does it no longer matter whether there is someone at the helm of the agencies responsible for securing our airports?

How is this acceptable behavior in the Senate? It would not be acceptable
behavior around my kitchen table. If it is not acceptable there, it should not be acceptable here. There are too many examples of qualified, noncontroversial nominees, such as Martha Johnson, the GSA Administrator with impeccable qualifications whose nomination was held for 9 months. Yet she was confirmed by a 96-to-0 vote once the hold on her nomination was removed.

These nominations are being blocked even though they have broad bipartisan support.

I urge my colleagues to remove their holds on noncontroversial administration nominees and allow confirmation votes.

I yield the floor.

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