Posted on 01/29/2003 10:31:07 PM PST by Utah Girl
New York’s Sen. Charles Schumer (D) once memorably said that Bush White House judicial nominee Miguel Estrada “is like a stealth missile — with a nose cone — coming out of the right wing’s deepest silo.”
It was never entirely clear what the nose cone had to do with anything. But it is clear that tomorrow, after nearly two years of waiting, Estrada will finally come out of his right-wing silo and, if all goes as expected, win approval from the Senate Judiciary Committee.
But not without a fight. Lacking any evidence against Estrada — a damaging gaffe, indefensible judicial position, membership in a restricted club — Democrats will charge that there are simply too many unanswered questions about his legal views to justify confirmation. And they plan a last-gasp —- and unprecedented — attempt to pressure the Bush administration to release a trove of confidential opinion papers Estrada wrote while a lawyer in the Justice Department’s Office of Solicitor General from 1992 to 1997.
Estrada’s opponents don’t have a clue what’s in the papers. They don’t have any allegation of wrongdoing that might be cleared up by seeing them. But they still wonder if there might be anything in there that could be used to show that Estrada is, to use their favorite word, an “extremist.”
The documents have been the subject of a long-running behind-the-scenes war of letters between Democrats and the Bush Justice Department. When then-Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) first asked for the papers last year, the department refused, calling them “highly privileged.” Then, when Leahy persisted, it arranged for all seven living former solicitors general — four who served under Democrats, three under Republicans — to write the chairman, saying release of the Estrada papers would be a terrible idea.
The issue went away, largely because Democrats put the Estrada nomination into cold storage, with no guarantee that he would ever receive a vote. But now, with Republicans back in control and Estrada headed for approval, Democrats are chasing the papers once more.
Last week Schumer wrote a letter to Attorney General John Ashcroft, suggesting that the department’s decision not to release the documents had “thwarted” the Senate’s consent power, leaving senators with “distressingly little to go on in evaluating whether or not [Estrada] has extreme views that may make him an unacceptable choice.”
Schumer also claimed the department has released such papers in the past. Back in the 1980s, he wrote, it had “apparently provided” the committee with memos from the Solicitor General Office as part of the failed Robert Bork confirmation battle.
But it turns out the department never “apparently provided” anything during the Bork fight; whatever the committee received back then had been illegally leaked by persons unknown. In a tart same-day response to Schumer, Acting Assistant Attorney General Jamie Brown wrote, “Your mere possession of these documents does not suggest that the department waived applicable privileges nor authorized their disclosure.” Translation: You can forget about seeing the documents.
Undeterred, Schumer insists that he needs the papers because he is troubled by those unanswered questions about Estrada’s views. But Republicans wonder just how troubled Schumer really is. If he’s so worried, they ask, why didn’t he take advantage of a golden opportunity to ask Estrada anything he wanted?
That opportunity came last September, after Estrada’s confirmation hearing, a session that ended with Schumer looking Estrada squarely in the eye and saying, “This hearing has raised more questions than you have answered.” Normally, when a senator is unsatisfied with what he has heard in a hearing, he sends written follow-up questions to the nominee. But committee and administration spokesmen say Schumer never asked Estrada any follow-up questions. None. Perhaps all those questions were troubling — but not, apparently, troubling enough to actually ask.
Maybe Schumer’s concerns were all for show. Or maybe he assumed Democrats would keep control of the committee and could force Estrada to come back for a second hearing anytime they chose. Either way, there’s nothing he can do now to stop Estrada from winning committee approval. All that’s left is to point to those troubling “questions.” Last week, when Republicans announced their intention to bring Estrada up for a vote, Schumer quickly released a statement headlined simply, “Schumer: Estrada Must Answer Questions.”
Questions, questions, questions. Too bad Schumer didn’t ask when he had the chance.
Byron York is White House correspondent for National Review. His column will appear in The Hill each Wednesday. Byork@thehill.com
Class vs. narcissists.
They are in the moral equivalent of a death spin, IMO.
Boxers or briefs?
Oh, thanks for that mental picture.
Now, correct me if I am wrong here, but didn't the ABA give Estrada its highest possible rating?
And weren't the Democrats whining not so long ago about the decision by the Bush Administration to take away the power of the ABA to trump any judicial nominee
? And wasn't pasrt of the Democrats' argument then that the ABA sets the highest possible standard for judicial nominees?
How in the world then can Sen. Schumer say that he and other senators had distressingly little to go on in evaluating whether or not .....?
It would seem to me that he and other Dems have had all the information they need -- the highest possible rating on Estrada from the ABA.
IMHO, Rudy should run against Chuckie, where he has an excellent chance of winning and giving us an additional seat in the Senate. Pataki's term ends in 2006, and he can run against Hillary, and have a decent shot at her, especially if she keep talking. But to leave Schumer in place and then have Rudy lose to a very well-funded Hillary is the nightmare scenario.
We should avoid it and get Chuckie out ASAP.
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