Posted on 10/17/2014 4:15:07 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
On Tuesday, exactly three weeks before the midterm elections, the White House confirmed that President Obama would not be nominating a new attorney general until after the elections. Media reports indicate that the decision to delay was requested by Senate Democrats and was done to avoid the nomination being "caught up in election year politics."
Sen. Chuck Grassley (Iowa), the ranking Republican (and if the Republicans take back the majority, the next chairman) of the Senate Judiciary Committee, in equating the move to the president's delay of the threatened executive action on immigration, said that "[f]irst it was immigration, and now Senate Democrats have asked the president to delay this announcement for attorney general so they can avoid making clear to the voters of their states where they stand on what could be a controversial choice for attorney general."
What is interesting is that the White House, by delaying the nomination, may have well injected the issue into the election year politics, precisely what they wanted to avoid. I would not be surprised to see candidates using this issue in competitive red-state races.
Delay can signal one of two directions
To those familiar with the confirmation process, this move to delay can mean one of two things: (1) that the type of nominee the president is considering appointing will likely be one that is controversial; or (2) he is waiting to see the results of the Arkansas Senate race, and perhaps allow him the option of considering Sen. Mark Pryor (D) for attorney general.
The reason some think the White House is considering a more controversial selection is the fact that without a controversial pick there should be little, if any, political backlash in the elections over the nominee. For example, if the president selected Preet Bharara, the current U.S. attorney in Manhattan, and a former chief counsel to Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), there would be almost no backlash. He is viewed as a law-and-order public servant with integrity. He is familiar to most of the current members of the Senate Judiciary Committee, which will be considering the nomination. He has taken on insider trading, corporate fraud as well as terrorism. He is also not one accused of being in the vast right-wing conspiracy, as he was the singularly responsible for the Senate's oversight investigation into the Bush administration's U.S. attorney firing, and the one Senate aide most responsible for the ultimate unceremonious resignation of former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.
Other noncontroversial nominees also are said to be considered, such as former Clinton-appointed U.S. attorney and current S.E.C. Chair Mary Jo White, who has also had a largely impeccable law enforcement record; and current senators from safe Democratic states Amy Klobuchar (Minn.) and Sheldon Whitehouse (R.I.), both former prosecutors. Or in the mold of what President George W. Bush did in nominating former federal judge Michael Mukasey, the president can nominate current D.C. District Court Judge Beryl Howell, who is a former federal prosecutor in New York, and a longtime trusted aide and former general counsel to Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.).
The White House's continued press-trial balloons about the possibility of nominating current Labor Secretary Tom Perez may signal that he is a leading candidate. Nominating him prior to the elections sure would inject controversy in the upcoming elections, about which Senate Democrats are right to be worried, and right to not want to happen prior to the elections. His nomination to the Department of Labor was only confirmed on a party-line vote and not one that would have survived had the filibuster not been eliminated through the so-called "nuclear option." There were questions that were raised about certain cases while he served at the Justice Department, which would all be fair game as a nominee to run the department.
Whether it is a controversial nominee or Sen. Pryor that led to the White House's decision to delay the nomination, the few weeks after the elections will be filled with anxious jockeying. The nomination may well be delayed again if control of the Senate will not be clear until potential runoff elections in Louisiana and Georgia.
Regardless of the results of the elections, one thing seems to be clear: The White House and Senate Democrats would like to get the nominee confirmed in the lame-duck session and prior to the seating of newly elected senators in January. That, in and of itself, will be cause for some outcries and controversy, though not likely to block the nomination.
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Delrahim is partner at Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck, LLP. He previously served as chief counsel and staff director of the Senate Judiciary Committee under Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) and as former deputy assistant attorney general at the Department of Justice.
Face it. Holder isn’t going anywhere, but now he has cover because he’s resigned.
Youll note that Obama has said he’s not naming a replacement until after the election. He didn’t say he was waiting until after the new Senate takes office. I’m sure the plan is for him and Reid to push someone through in the lame-duck session
Oct 17, 2014 - The Hill: "Sen. Mark Pryor (D-Ark.) is struggling after a spate of recent missteps, and Democrats even privately admit he needs a near-perfect finish to survive.
The Democratic incumbent has trailed Rep. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) in most public polling since mid-summer and is now dealing with a pair of recent verbal stumbles.
In Tuesday’s debate he said the middle class extended up to families making $200,000 a year — nearly four times the median household income of the Natural State. Days earlier, he’d struggled to come up with a response when asked about the Obama administration’s handling of Ebola.
The money momentum is also on Cotton’s side. The GOP congressman hauled in $3.9 million from July through September, nearly double the $2.2 million Pryor brought in, and has a warchest nearly three times as large as Pryor’s with $2.9 million in the bank to Pryor’s $1 million.
Pryor, however, invested heavily in field operations and already bought most of his television ad time for the remainder of the campaign, making the cash disparity less of a problem since the two sides will roughly be at parity with their ads. But money tends to follow momentum, and Cotton’s bigger haul is a sign of which candidate the donor class feels has the upper hand.
With just three weeks to go, Pryor has trailed Cotton in all but one nonpartisan public poll dating back to the beginning of September. Democratic polling has the race in a dead heat, but the GOP's internal numbers give Cotton a lead consistently outside the margin of error. President Obama’s unfavorable rating has been in the low 30s in many polls, an albatross around Pryor’s neck.
The verbal stumbles privately have Democrats more worried. “The debates didn't help,” admited one national Democratic strategist.
"I'd say probably up to $200,000, there's different definitions but that's my working definition," Pryor said when asked during Tuesday’s debate what his definition of a middle-class family was.
Cotton jumped on the remark...................."
The actions of his entire tenure if office have been furtive, surreptitious and illicit...Why change NOW?
Susan Rice has probably been promised the job for her ability to lie to the public with a straight face.
Are Obama’s decisions so bad that he can only do things during a lame duck session?
Not that I share the author's characterization of Preet Bharara, but since when has Obama demonstrated any interest whatsoever in appointing anyone possessing even a modicum of integrity to such a position?
Why would anyone with even half a brain believe that anything has changed?
In considering the type of nomination he is likely to make there are the following facts:
1) The day after the election it appears Obama will grant amnesty to illegals through executive action. This will be an unprecedented power grab by the executive branch and will likely result in extensive litigation.
2) If the Republicans take the Senate, Obama will attempt to rule through executive orders and court decrees obtained from the many leftist judges he has appointed. He will need an AG with like mind to assist him.
3) Holder has highly politicized the Justice Department and used it to punish the political enemies of the President. No doubt there is incriminating information in the files plus a number of programs currently underway to further Obama’s agenda. A non-political AG with integrity might put an end to the games.
4) The naming of the nominee is being delayed until after the election. If the new AG were a woman or man of impeccable credentials, and known for non-partisanship, the smart political move would be to announce the nomination now so the press could amplify the praise coming from McCain, Graham, Hatch, Alexander and other “moderate” Republicans.
Given the above, it is hard to envision anyone but a hard core leftist ideologue getting the job. If the GOP captures the Senate on election day, Reid will jam the nomination through the Senate in the lame duck session. The RINO Senators will bleat a little bit for show and go into closed session to determine how they will rearrange the deck chairs when they take command in January.
The Rats also need to focus all their attention on the multitude of voter fraud schemes that they have in the works. Conservatives need to win in a landslide just to break even.
What will this reveal 9 days before elections? Is this why Holder is resigning?
The second and third in line are bailing too. They have been told they are not candidates for the job. They are getting out while the getting is good.
Any bets that they will release anything that isn’t so redacted that it says something. The stonewall will continue. They have gotten away with it so far. Who will/can stop them?
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