ConfirmThem

Keeping fingers crossed, and not that it's a lot, but it looks like the Haynes nomination will be cleared by the Judiciary Committee today. Here's Leahy's comment:

http://judiciary.senate.gov/member_statement.cfm?id=3236&wit_id=2629

With new pressure building against the Dems' obstruction of COA candidates (i.e. the recent statements of McConnell, Specter and Hatch), Leahy and the Dems need to diffuse any Republican momentum on the topic of judges. By quickly confirming Haynes and the four district court nominees already on the Executive Calendar within the week, the Dems will seek to show the "speed" with which they have been dealing with the confirmation process.

My prediction is that the Dems will then attempt to put the four district court nominees with hearings today as well as Pratter on the Executive Calendar by the end of the month so that those five can be confirmed in May. In June, they will probably confirm Agee and four more district court nominees. That only leaves July to argue about the remaining 8 Bush COA nominees. No doubt, the Dems will portray those 8 as "radical ultra-conservatives" and then refuse to confirm them using the Thurmond Rule as an excuse.

The nomination of Catharina Haynes to be a United States Circuit Court Judge for the Fifth Circuit was reported to the full senate via a voice vote at this morning's executive business meeting.

Thanks, Mose, for the info - and Bobo for your thoughts. I share Bobo's feeling that the Dems are trying to do barely enough to seem reasonable and no more.

Today's step isn't much, but it's better than nothing I suppose.

I would not be surprised if Catharina Haynes is confirmed in the full Senate by voice vote as well. Jennifer Walker Elrod, who had almost the same credentials as Haynes, was confirmed in that way.

Given Leahy's Statement at the Business meeting today, virtually promising prompt action on Agee, it is now evident that the Senate will confirm Agee after Haynes and Pratter (assuming no unforeseen complications).

Agree with BoBo that the other CCA nominees are vitually dead this year. The only slight chance for a 4th CCA confirmation this year appears to be another 4th-Virginia nomination from the Webb-Warner list. Given Leahy's statement, Bush should call the Dems' bluff and promply nominate someone from the Webb-Warner list to the 4th Circuit. Even if it's not successful (which I fear is probable), I don't see how it could hurt, since Conrad, Matthews, Rosenstein and the rest appear to be in Terminal Limbo anyway.

http://cqpolitics.com/wmspage.cfm?parm1=5&docID=news-000002696762

"Senate Judiciary Committee Republicans launched an attack Thursday against the slow pace of approving appellate court nominations, warning that they were contemplating more substantive retaliation.

“I think we all know where this is headed right now,” said Kansas Republican Sam Brownback .

He pleaded with committee Chairman Patrick J. Leahy , D-Vt., to move more quickly on nominees “so you don’t force guys like me to say ‘okay, I guess we have to take extraordinary actions.’”

All but one of the nine Republicans on the panel — an unusually high number — attended a committee markup to speak on the subject.

Republicans appear to be laying the groundwork for a more overt offensive, but the immediate effect of their strategy was to delay a committee vote on the nomination of Catharina Haynes to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit. The Haynes nomination eventually was approved by voice vote.

Leahy said that “I will not do to (President Bush) what Republicans did to President Clinton” in bottling up dozens of district and appellate court nominees.

Sen. Charles E. Schumer , D-N.Y., dismissed the notion that Republicans could reap political benefits by touting the issue.

“I think that very conservative people know they no longer control the legislature and can’t get anything out of the presidency and their goal is get as many hard-right people on the bench as possible,” Schumer said."

http://www.madisonproject.com/drewblog/?p=210

"This morning, however, things began to go south for the Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee. For months Chairman Leahy has refused to schedule hearings for circuit court nominees. That changed this morning. Though they hold a majority in committee, all the Republicans showed this morning versus five Democrats. Outnumbered almost 2 to 1, the Democrats got rolled. Chairman Leahy tried to move on other issues, Senator Specter kept bringing it back to the subject of judges. Senator Feinstein of California tried to give Chairman Leahy cover by reading off percentages of judges confirmed under President Bush versus those confirmed under President Clinton to which Senator Kyl of Arizona responded with actual numbers-Clinton got 15 circuit court noms confirmed during his final two years in office, Bush has only gotten 6 to date. The numbers regarding district court noms is roughly the same, ie Clinton got almost twice as many as Bush has gotten to date.

Probably what was the most disconcerting moment during the hearing this morning was when Senator Coburn challenged Leahy on why “Good judges like Robert Conrad have not received a hearing, 250 days after his nomination?” Leahy was obviously caught off guard, consulted with his chief consul and then said, “I believe the hold up is due to Conrad’s anti-Catholic remarks.” While I guessed Leahy was referring to Conrad calling Sister Prejean’s book Dead Man Walking “liberal drivel,” his comment was disingenuous at best. Robert Conrad is a man who takes his Catholic faith very seriously. Coburn’s response was perfect, “IF that is true, then that is why we have hearings, to air things like that out in public.”
At the end of the committee meeting, something happened that even caught me off guard-Leahy asked for a voice vote on Catharina Haynes, the nominee for the 5th Circuit. She was voted out by voice vote. The Democrat members in the room didn’t even ask for a roll call vote. Their bluff had been called and they knew it.

The tide turned just a little bit this morning regarding the fight on judges. I am interested to see how it goes in the following weeks.

http://www.committeeforjustice.org/blog/2008/04/todays-dramatic-showdown...

"One of the most memorable moments came when Sen. Tom Coburn pressed Leahy about when he would allow a hearing for Fourth Circuit nominee Judge Robert Conrad. Conrad meets Leahy’s requirement for home state senator support and is needed to fill a vacancy declared a judicial emergency. Leahy refused to answer Coburn, instead accusing Judge Conrad of making "anti-Catholic comments." Coburn responded that Leahy’s charges were all the more reason to schedule a hearing during which Conrad could be questioned.

The dramatic confrontation bore immediate fruit, as Fifth Circuit nominee Catharina Haynes was voted out of committee. Leahy had been expected to comply with People for the American Way’s demand, in a March 31 letter, that the Committee “not proceed” with her nomination.

Perhaps the most ominous words came from Sen. Sam Brownback when he said "I think we all know where this is headed" – an obvious reference to the bitter and prolonged Senate showdown and shutdown over judges that only Sen. Leahy can head off. Earlier in the week, Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell warned that “Republicans will be forced to consider other options” if the obstruction of judicial nominees continues."

"Is the fact that Keisler is Jewish similarly contributing to his obstruction by Democrats? There is no way to know. But it’s worth noting that, of the nine appeals court nominees currently being obstructed, three are Jewish."

I assume Curt is referring to Keisler, Shalom Stone and Rod Rosenstein as the three Jewish nominees.

I think the Dems don't care if a nominee is Catholic or Jewish. I think they care more if the nominee is a white male. In politics, it's easier to bash white males than it is to bash either females or minority races. That alone gives them more to use against the likes of Conrad or Keisler. Not that it would change much this late in the game, but Bush might be better served nominating conservative females or minority judicial nominees in the future.

We've reached this point a dozen times in the last four years and every time Frist, McConnell, Hatch, Specter ... they all back down.

The sad part is that a lot of this is Bush's fault. The Dems reportedly were going to pass a lot of executive nominees and a few judges at Christmas, but Bush would have had to promise not to recess appointment ONE of his appointees.

Nice job, George.

As for Judges, unless they bring the Senate to a halt NOW and demand judicial hearings within the next month or so, Leahy will just run out the clock.

Oz:

By the time of the Christmas recess, due to the virtual shutdown in confirmation hearings last autumn, there were no nominees on the Executive Calendar and only 1 nominee (Keisler: hearing in August 2006) who had even been given a hearing, much less voted out of Committee.

It is therefore rather difficult for me to comprehend just how several more judicial nominees could have been confirmed in December in any case.

I agree with the rest of your post.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/23/AR200712...

"Reid decided that enough is enough and held this sort of pro forma session over Thanksgiving, then decided to do it again after talks with White House Chief of Staff Joshua B. Bolten broke down. In this case, Reid said, it came down to one nominee -- Steven G. Bradbury for assistant attorney general. As acting head of the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel in 2005, Bradbury signed two secret memos authorizing harsh CIA interrogation techniques on terrorism suspects -- techniques that critics deem torture. Reid said "there is no chance" Bradbury would be confirmed, yet Bush refused to rule out giving him a recess appointment.

Reid said he offered to confirm 60 stalled Republican nominees and eight Democrats to various positions if Bush would give up Bradbury, but he refused. "Think about this," Reid said last week. "Because the president wants one person whom we cannot get out of the Judiciary Committee, he is willing to hold everything up. It doesn't sound like much of a compromise to me." Reid sent through those nominees anyway because "I am not going to meet stubbornness with stubbornness.""

**********
Could be my bad about the Judicials ....

http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/gop-still-ponders-shutdown-over-judi...

"
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said Thursday he has not ruled out the option of shutting down the chamber to put fresh pressure on Democrats to confirm President Bush’s stalled judicial nominees.
“We’re certainly not happy with the situation, and a lot of different options to respond to that are under consideration,” McConnell told The Hill when asked about whether he was open to bringing the chamber’s business to a halt.

“We’ve made no decisions on where we go from here,” he added. “But there is a widespread sense of dissatisfaction about the way circuit court nominees have been treated.”

His statement came after Republicans brought a Judiciary Committee meeting to a near-standstill to vent their frustrations with what they said was Democratic foot-dragging to confirm 10 pending nominees to federal appeals courts."

"Leahy accused Republicans of stalling action in the Judiciary Committee, including in February when the GOP denied him a quorum during committee markups. By griping on Thursday, he said the Republicans were using up the committee time’s that would be better used considering one nominee on the agenda — Catharina Haynes — to sit on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit, which covers disputes in Southern states.

“You’re filibustering your own judge,” Leahy demurred.

After an hour of sniping, the committee later approved the Haynes nomination by a voice vote."

http://afjjusticewatch.blogspot.com/2008/04/senate-judiciary-republicans...

"In one of the most shocking displays of partisan squabbling we’ve seen in some time, the Senate Judiciary Committee broke into chaos today while attempting to hold a vote on controversial Bush nominee Catherina Haynes, who would fill the final vacancy on the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals. During the Committee’s executive business meeting, all but one Republican Committee member joined Ranking Member Arlen Specter (R-PA), Orrin Hatch (R-UT) and Sam Brownback (R-KS) in blasting what they called efforts by Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and his fellow Democrats to derail several Bush circuit court nominees.

Republicans on the Committee, who seem to have galvanized behind Sen. Specter’s plan to stall Senate procedures, appeared to take turns denouncing their Democratic colleagues. According to Congressional Quarterly, Sen. Brownback griped, “I think we all know where this is headed right now,” and warned that slow progression on Bush’s nominees might “force guys like [him] to say ‘okay, I guess we have to take extraordinary actions.’”

While reports have been circulating for some time that Sen. Specter was considering “shutting down the Senate” in the hopes of forcing movement on judges, today’s Committee outburst was really only successful in delaying the vote on Fifth Circuit nominee Catherina Haynes, amounting to what Chairman Leahy called a “filibustering of [their] own judge.” When Chairman Leahy finally sounded the two-minute warning, the absurdity of the Republicans' endless bickering appeared to seep in, prompting Sen. Specter to call on his colleagues to wrap up their sniping in order to hold a voice vote on Haynes. Committee Republicans were left with just enough time to push through her nomination.

When the meeting adjourned, Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY) dismissed the complaints of his Republican colleagues, claiming that “conservative[s]…know they no longer control the legislature…and their goal is [to] get as many hard-right people on the bench as possible.” In a statement released this afternoon, Alliance for Justice echoed Sen. Schumer’s concerns and called on the Senate to refuse hearings for all controversial nominees, particularly those who lack the support of their home-state senators."

http://www.afj.org/about-afj/press/04032008.html

"Today's insistence by Ranking Member Arlen Specter that the Senate Judiciary Committee give hearings next week to three nominees to the Fourth Circuit is part of President Bush's relentless scheme to secure an ultraconservative hold on the judiciary for decades to come by sliding bad nominees in under the wire. The Senate has a Constitutional responsibility to protect the rights of all Americans by putting a stop to this plan. Today, by reporting favorably the nomination of Catharina Haynes to the Fifth Circuit, the Committee has shamefully shirked its responsibility and, instead, has greased the wheels of President Bush's court-packing machine."

If the Liberal-radicals like Aron scream with this intensity about the relatively innocuous C. Haynes, can you imagine the ruckus they will raise over Pratter, Agee, and any ensuing CCA nominees?

Keisler would be thermonuclear.

Heck he said it best himself.

Reid said he offered to confirm 60 stalled Republican nominees and eight Democrats to various positions if Bush would give up Bradbury, but he refused. "Think about this," Reid said last week. "Because the president wants one person whom we cannot get out of the Judiciary Committee, he is willing to hold everything up. It doesn't sound like much of a compromise to me." Reid sent through those nominees anyway because "I am not going to meet stubbornness with stubbornness.""

For each nominee you don't like, you block at least 60 others until the President relents.

Then of course you just pick another one you don't like.

Life is easy when you think like a Democrat.