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Never seen before video of Dr. Rand Paul questioning Dr. Rachel Levine.

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) is facing criticism for his questioning of one of President Biden’s health nominees, Rachel Levine, a former state health official who would be the first openly transgender federal official confirmed by the Senate. Paul characterized gender-affirming care, including surgical treatments for transgender individuals, as “genital mutilation,” a description not supported by mainstream health care experts. “It is really critical to me that our nominees be treated with respect and that our questions focus on their qualifications and the work ahead of us, rather than ideological and harmful misrepresentations like those we heard from Senator Paul earlier,”...

Dr. Rachel Levine is an American pediatrician who served as Secretary of the Pennsylvania Department of Health from 2017 to 2021 and is now nominated to serve as President Biden's assistant HHS secretary.(CNSNews.com) - Unafraid to address the transgender issue staring lawmakers in the face, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) on Thursday asked Dr. Rachel Levine (nee Richard) if she believes "minors are capable of making such a life-changing decision as changing one's sex."Levine, President Biden's nominee for assistant secretary of health, now lives as a woman.Twice, Levine gave Sen. Paul the same rehearsed, non-answer to his question:Well, Senator, thank you...

Dr. Rand Paul Questions Rachel Levine During Confirmation Hearing (Transgender Children) Video...

The U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday put new restrictions on presidential powers, limiting a president's authority to staff certain top government posts in a case involving an appointment to the National Labor Relations Board. The court decided 6-2 to uphold a lower court's ruling that then-President Barack Obama exceeded his legal authority with his temporary appointment of an NLRB general counsel in 2011. In an opinion by Chief Justice John Roberts, the court said that under the Federal Vacancies Reform Act, a person cannot serve as the acting head of a federal agency once the president nominates him or her...

And we have looooooong memories I hear that Sens. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Susan Collins of Maine, both Republicans who have decided to oppose the nomination of Betsy DeVos for Secretary of Education, take a lot of money from teacher unions. That’s unusual for Republicans, but they’re unusual Republicans. They’re by no means conservative on many issues, and whenever an effort is underway to pass an important conservative legislative priority, these two are usually among the most nervous and hard-to-persuade Republican senators.

Petulance not rewarded today Congratulations to Democrats on the Senate Finance Committee. They have achieved an almost impossible goal: They refused to show up and do their jobs, and yet they somehow managed to fail at not doing them. As a result, that nominations of Tom Price for Secretary of Health and Human Services and Steve Mnuchin for Secretary of the Treasury are on their way to the full Senate for likely confirmation. The Democrats’ gambit was boycott the Finance Committee votes on both nominees, thus preventing the Republican majority from taking a vote because the rules say there has...

Mike Barnicle learned a lesson the hard way this morning: expect to be embarrassed if you challenge Kellyanne Conway without having all your ducks in a row. On Morning Joe, the subject was the Trump plan to repeal and replace Obamacare. Barnicle snidely asked Conway “now, do you or do you not have a replacement plan ready to go, ramped up, ready to go, say tomorrow?” When Conway pointed out that there wasn’t a confirmed HHS Secretary in place and that she hoped that the Senate Democrats would cooperate on timely and fair hearings, Barnicle sarcastically responded: “so you’re asking...

The Senate confirmed four of President Obama’s executive and judicial nominees Thursday. Theodore Chuang and George Hazel will serve as U.S. district judges for Maryland. The Senate voted 53-42 on Chuang’s nomination and 95-0 on Hazel’s. Senate Judiciary Committee ranking member Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) said he couldn’t support Chuang’s nomination because he helped the Obama administration “stonewall” Congress on the investigation of the death of four Americans at the U.S. compound in Benghazi, Libya. “I can’t support his nomination because of the central role Mr. Chuang played in the administration’s efforts to stonewall an investigation into the situation in Benghazi,”...

The Senate easily confirmed President Barack Obama’s selection for ambassador to the United Nations on Thursday, capping a month in which senators used a bipartisan truce on once-mired nominations to fill a cluster of vacancies in the president’s second-term administration. Senators approved Samantha Power for the post by 87-10. The vote put the former Obama foreign policy adviser and outspoken human rights advocate into the job formerly held by Susan Rice, whom the president has made his national security adviser. … Power joined a stack of nominees that senators have approved since striking a bipartisan deal in mid-July. Republicans agreed...

Americans who are concerned about traditional freedoms and the Second Amendment have no difficulty understanding the message of the popular bumper strip: "If guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns." It should be just as easy to grasp the corollary: If nukes are outlawed, only terrorist countries will have nukes. But somehow, Barack Obama and Chuck Hagel don't get it. In a 2007 campaign speech, Obama promised: "Here's what I'll say as president: America seeks a world in which there are no nuclear weapons." Chuck Hagel is listed as one of six directors of a dangerous group called "Global...

Washington continues to talk, but only talk, about the danger of Bashar al-Assad's increasingly desperate regime in Syria distributing its arsenal of high-tech or even nuclear weapons to terrorists throughout the Mideast. Meanwhile, the Israelis continue to act. Five years ago, they took out a nuclear reactor the Syrians were building without seeing any need to noise it about, realizing that action speaks louder than words -- and that much of the world, especially the Bush administration back then, would discreetly approve. This time the Israelis aren't saying anything official about what seems to have happened to a convoy of...

President Barack Obama signed a bill Friday evening that would exempt some senior-level presidential appointees from Senate confirmation. Sponsored by Democratic Sen. Chuck Schumer and cosponsored by Republicans and Democrats, the bill, now law, weakens the power of the legislature and strengthens the executive branch, critics have warned. The bill skated through the Senate three months after being introduced in 2011 and was passed by the Republican-controlled House 216-116 in July. The law now allows Obama and future presidents to name appointees to senior positions in every branch of the administration, from the Department of the Treasury to the Department...

Four Republican senators seek to cut off money to czars in the Obama administration and force current and future czars to undergo a Senate confirmation. The senators, David Vitter of Louisiana, Rand Paul of Kentucky, Dean Heller of Nevada and Chuck Grassley of Iowa, have introduced the amendment in the Nominations Process Reform Bill. Heller said the amendment, which defines czar as the “head of any task force, council, policy office or similar office established by the president that has not been confirmed by the U.S. Senate,” excluding the National Security Advisor, could return some accountability to the current administration’s...

Dancing with the Czars: Obama's New State-Run Show The cast of Obama Czars hit the dance floor on the new show with the highly anticipated season premiere of Dancing with the Czars . You will be introduced to twelve Czars, who hold varying positions of power within the administration. The great thing about them is that Czars operate with impunity and are "under the radar" when it comes to making policy. They are accountable to no one except the President and, oh man, can they dance.  The rules are unknown and the Czars don't have to undergo Senate Confirmation Hearings,...

Senate confirmation of Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius to head the Department of Health and Human Services probably won’t take place until after the coming two-week recess because at least one senator has objected to an expedited procedure to move the nomination. “I’m afraid there’s a senator who will not grant consent so that means it has to be delayed until after the recess,” Finance Chairman Max Baucus , D-Mont., said Thursday. Baucus would not name the senator other than to say he or she is a Republican. -snip- The Obama administration appears to have dodged a Senate battle over abortion...

As attention focuses on the lack of people at Treasury to help the beleagured Tim Geithner, Dems–with a helping hand from the MSM– naturally try to shift the blame to Republicans, accusing them of holding up nominations. We just had a perfect example of the phenomenon as—with an assist from Andrea Mitchell—John Kerry decried the intrusion of “partisan politics” into the confirmation process. Mitchell wanted to “clear up what you’re talking about” by explaining to viewers that “it’s probably Republicans” who have put holds on nominees. Thanks, Andrea. But I found myself wondering: has the great junior senator from Massachusetts...

A Bush nominee to the Supreme Court may be probed about whether he or she would overturn earlier high-court rulings. Whomever President Bush nominates to fill Sandra Day O'Connor's seat on the US Supreme Court will inherit enormous power immediately upon confirmation. It is the power to assume Justice O'Connor's role of breaking deadlocks in major cases. But perhaps more important, it includes the raw judicial power to overturn many of O'Connor's decisions, should four other like-minded justices agree to take up the task. With high-court opinions on affirmative action, school vouchers, states' rights, and so-called "partial birth" abortion hanging...

Who's Being 'Extremist,' Black Conservative AsksBy Susan JonesCNSNews.com Senior EditorJune 8, 2005(CNSNews.com) -- Members of the Congressional Black Caucus reportedly plan to march into the Senate on Wednesday to show their opposition to California Supreme Court Justice Janice Rogers Brown.The Senate is expected to confirm Brown's nomination to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, following a two-year filibuster by Democrats.One black conservative says Senate Democrats are behaving like extremists: "They should stop blocking the courthouse door and vote to confirm Judge Janice Rogers Brown," said the Rev. Jesse Lee Peterson, founder and president of BOND, the...

Poll: No rubber-stamp Senate Most in survey favor scrutiny and say judges should be conservative By WILL LESTER Associated Press WASHINGTON - More than three-quarters of Americans say the Senate should aggressively examine federal judicial nominees and not just approve them because they are the president's choices. That's one of the few aspects of this divisive issue that gets widespread agreement, according to an Associated Press-Ipsos poll released Friday. Respondents favored conservative over liberal judges in general, 47 percent to 39 percent. As for a possible Supreme Court nominee, 52 percent said they felt comfortable that President Bush would pick...