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Chuck Grassley Tag

Posted by Mary Chastain on September 24, 2018 113 Comments
Supreme Court nominee Judge Brett Kavanaugh has told Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley and Ranking Member Dianne Feinstein that he will not withdraw. He wrote:
These are smears, pure and simple. And they debase our public discourse. But they are also a threat to any man or woman who wishes to serve our country. Such grotesque and obvious character assassination—if allowed to succeed—will dissuade competent and good people of all political persuasions from service.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on May 18, 2018 18 Comments
Pretty much since the 2016 election we've been tracking the potential Donald Trump has to fundamentally alter the federal judiciary. At various times we've expressed frustration with the ability of Democrats to slow down the Senate confirmation process. We've also recognized that for the most part Judiciary Chair Chuck Grassley and Majority Leader Mitch McConnell have kept nominees moving through the pipeline.

Posted by Mary Chastain on January 24, 2018 36 Comments
Text messages between FBI agent Peter Strzok and FBI lawyer Lisa Page came to light last month due to the anti-Trump rhetoric involved. Now the FBI claims that the department "failed to preserve" five months of text messages between them. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Ron Johnson (R-WI) have sent a letter to the Department of Justice (DOJ) to demand answers over the missing text messages between Strzok and Page.

Posted by Jared Samilow on January 07, 2018 17 Comments
Year One of President Trump's much-vaunted "judge story" was far more successful than anyone could have expected. Trump nominated and confirmed more appellate circuit court judges in his first year than any modern president. His judges were, on average, just 50 years old and all of them were well-credentialed conservatives. Several are potential SCOTUS nominees.

Posted by Mary Chastain on January 05, 2018 19 Comments
Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), also a member of the committee, have asked the Department of Justice to investigate Christopher Steele, the author of the infamous dossier on then-candidate Donald Trump. The senators told the DOJ that they believe Steele made false statements to the FBI concerning his talks with news outlets about the dossier.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on January 04, 2018 33 Comments
After Trump fired him, James Comey leaked four (4) of seven (7) internal FBI memos he created regarding his interactions with Trump to a Columbia Law School professor, for the purpose of passing on the contents to a reporter. The professor did just that, and it created the basis for NY Times reporting that Trump had demanded a "loyalty" pledge and also raised the issue of shutting down the investigation into Michael Flynn. Comey would testify to the same effect before Congress, which is when the fact of his leak came out under questioning by Susan Collins, almost by accident, and without any meaningful follow up to the bombshell testimony.

Posted by Mary Chastain on December 21, 2017 7 Comments
USA Today has dropped another article on the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) as the publication continues its investigation into the department. This investigation discovered that a VA policy has allowed hospitals to hire health care providers with revoked licenses, but it's illegal to do so thanks to a 1999 law:
The VA issued national guidelines in 2002 giving local hospitals discretion to hire clinicians after “prior consideration of all relevant facts surrounding” any revocations and as long as they still had a license in one state. But a federal law passed in 1999 bars the VA from employing any health care worker whose license has been yanked by any state.

Posted by Mary Chastain on December 15, 2017 24 Comments
Top Republicans in Congress continue to scrutinize the anti-President Donald Trump texts between FBI officials Peter Strzok and Lisa Page. The two officials were romantically involved and worked on Special Counsel Robert Mueller's Russia investigation. He kicked Strzok off the team over the summer due to these texts. But a specific text caught the eye of the top Republicans. In this one, it mentions an "insurance policy" against Trump's presidency and a man named Andy, which they have assumed means FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on December 15, 2017 14 Comments
Donald Trump took office with the unprecedented ability to reshape the federal judiciary, with over 100 vacancies as of the Inauguration. Trump had the possibility of nominating in just one term in office nearly half the federal judiciary. Democrats' removal of the judicial filibuster in 2013 (the so-called Nuclear Option) cleared the way for Republicans to fill these vacancies regardless of Democrat objections, assuming Republicans retain control of the Senate in 2018.

Posted by Mary Chastain on December 11, 2017 12 Comments
The GOP in Congress are no doubt desperate for a victory after the failed Obamacare repeal attempts, but that desperation could come back and bite them. They want to pass the tax bill before Christmas, but all the rushing and late nights have caused errors. From The Washington Post:
Questionable special-interest provisions have been stuffed in along the way, out of public view and in some cases literally in the dead of night. Drafting errors by exhausted staff are cropping up and need fixes, which must be tackled by congressional negotiators working to reconcile competing versions of the legislation passed separately by the House and the Senate.

Posted by Mary Chastain on December 04, 2017 34 Comments
This past summer, Special Counsel Robert Mueller removed an FBI agent from his investigation into possible collusion between Russia and President Donald Trump's campaign due to anti-Trump messages he sent. The news was only made public over the weekend. This agent, Peter Strzok, is also the man who changed former FBI Head James Comey's description of Hillary Clinton's handling of classified information on her private server when she served as secretary of state. Strzok also served as the No. 2 official in the counterintelligence division and led the investigation into her server.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on November 17, 2017 21 Comments
I noted yesterday that Chuck Grassley finally appears ready to clear the backlog in Judiciary Committee hearings on Appeals and District court judicial nominees, by preventing withholding of "blue slips" from becoming de facto filibusters, Chuck Grassley rips up “blue slip” stall, Al Franken left groping for alternative delay tactic. It then will be up to Mitch McConnell to get nominees floor votes, and to overcome Democrat stalling tactics to draw out each nominee, even the ones they don't oppose. The goal has to be:
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