Whatever happens today, I want to ensure my colleagues and, most
especially, him and the loyal and dedicated members of the Department
of Justice that I will support his work in his capacity as Deputy
Attorney General, if he is confirmed today, because the professionalism
of the Department of Justice is of preeminent interest for me
personally, having served as a U.S. attorney and also as attorney
general of my State, but it is also vitally important to the American
people. We must consider his nomination in the light of the looming
constitutional crisis that our Nation confronts. It is a crisis partly
of the administration's making by its attacks on the judiciary, calling
a member of the bench a ``so-called judge,'' saying to the American
people that a circuit court of appeals will be responsible for any
violence that may occur as a result of its ruling on the
constitutionality of Executive orders related to immigration, demeaning
and disparaging a judge because of his ethnic heritage--a judge born,
in fact, in Indiana. These kinds of attacks on the judiciary undermine respect and trust
in a branch of government that is the bulwark of our democracy and
that, in my view, when the history of this era is written, will be
regarded as having been one of its finest hours. We will be relying on
it to protect our Nation's fundamental rights and liberties.
Keywords matched
immigration