Before turning to the agenda, I’d like to say a few words about the Fast and Furious subpoena dispute.
On June 28, the House of Representatives voted to hold the Attorney General in contempt of Congress.
On the day before the House vote, White House Officials showed House staff fewer than 30 pages of documents, a tiny sliver of the documents they are withholding. No notes were allowed. And, there was only one copy of the documents in the room.
The White House called that an offer to resolve the Fast and Furious subpoena dispute in good faith. But, it still refused to detail exactly what it was willing to provide or what it insisted on withholding.
I understand the frustrations of the House leadership and understand why the House held Attorney General Holder in contempt.
I’m also concerned about the actions of another Justice Department attorney. Last month, a Justice Department attorney from the Civil Rights Division, attended a public meeting in Louisiana. She reportedly told a reporter who was present, “You can quote those who speak, but you can’t quote me.”
It has been reported that the reporter asked her to cite legal authority that would support her claim that he couldn’t quote a Justice Department attorney at a public meeting. The attorney said that the Justice Department has special rules on how its attorneys can be quoted. She did not back up that statement.
Supposedly, it’s Justice Department policy that the press would have fewer rights than the general public to quote what a government representative said. This undercuts the claim that “[t]his Administration has been the most transparent administration ever.”
There are reports that the Justice Department attorney then tried to kick the reporter out of the meeting for questioning her.
As if this wasn’t enough, she totally abused her power, according to press reports. She told the reporter that she could have the Justice Department call the newspaper’s publishers or editors, saying, “you don’t want to get on the Department of Justice’s bad side.”
That statement represents a raw abuse of power. Threatening to use the power to bring a criminal case or civil action against an entity because it had the audacity to insist that the Department of Justice obey the First Amendment is outrageous.
The newspaper has protested to the Justice Department and hasn’t to my knowledge received any response. The Department’s public comment on the incident doesn’t deny that any of the reported statements were made.
If the Department has a policy of preventing the press from quoting the statements of its attorneys at public meetings, that policy should be reversed immediately. And whether it has a policy or not, the attorney who claimed that such a policy existed, tried to expel a reporter from a public meeting for quoting her, and threatened the reporter for “get[ting] on the Department of Justice’s bad side,” should be appropriately disciplined.
Turning to the Committee’s agenda, on S.285, the private relief bill, I ask that the Chairman hold S.285 until the committee receives more information from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
Unfortunately, there’s been some confusion over the last few weeks about why Mr. Chukwueke told ICE that he was an orphan and had no family in the U.S. or in Nigeria.
We learned a few weeks ago that he actually has parents and six siblings living in Nigeria. This is a serious discrepancy.
As soon as we learned about the discrepancy, I asked ICE to provide any other background information or papers in his files; interview notes to understand what statements were made to ICE and the line of questioning that took place; and a list of databases queried and checks done by ICE.
Just yesterday, ICE agreed to provide access to the investigative file in this case. I welcome this review given the inconsistencies that need to be verified. The two-page report prepared by ICE in December of 2011 isn’t enough for us to make such a determination.
Members of this committee are being asked to confer permanent immigrant status to a foreign national, and that’s a responsibility I don’t take lightly. It’s imperative that we have all the information we need to make a decision — including interview notes from ICE investigators to determine why we have these seemingly false statements. We’re entitled to any and all information pertaining to Mr. Chukwueke before we’re asked to vote.
The Committee needs to review this investigative file in order to make an informed vote on this bill.
On S.1744, I believe that guardians play an important role. The bill creates a new purpose area for Older American Act grants for greater monitoring of guardians and for background checks. It authorizes no new federal spending.
I’m not certain what the proper role of the federal government is, if any, on this issue. However, I will not object to the bill’s passage.
With regard to S.3276, the FAA Sunsets Extension Act, I request that this bill be held over. This is an important bill that reauthorizes the FISA Amendments Act — a program vital to our national security.
This bill was reported out of the Intelligence Committee without amendment extending the program through 2017. The House Judiciary Committee and House Intelligence Committee have both reported a similar bill without amendment.
The Attorney General and the Director of National Intelligence have written to us stating that this reauthorization is “the highest legislative priority for the Intelligence Community” this Congress.
I agree with the Administration, the House Judiciary Committee, and the House and Senate Intelligence Committees that we should reauthorize this program as soon as possible without amendment.
However, because there are amendments the Chairman wishes to offer to this bill, we need to hold it over another week to study those proposals.
On the nominations, we are prepared to move forward with the nominations of Berg, Bernal, Schofield, and Williams, who have previously been held.
We request to hold over the nominations of Brann, Geraci, Mannion, Olguin, and Breyer.
I would note that we continue to make good progress in Committee, having taken action now on all but eight judicial nominees. Of course those nominees either have blue slip problems or have only recently been received in Committee.
So, I continue to have some frustration when the vacancy rate is blamed on Republicans, when in fact 42 of the 76 vacancies have no nominee. And with regard to confirmations, we are way ahead of the pace, considering the time we have spent on Supreme Court nominations.
Thank you.