DOJ and Judicial Nominations: Blanche, Nassar, Domenico, Byrne; Subcommittees

morning everybody on today's agenda we'll address an organization issue because this is our newest colleague senator graham's first markup i'll have a few words on that in a moment we'll be making it official that she'll fill the late senator graham's position on the subcommittees it's my understanding that we can adopt this measure by voice vote in terms of committee assignments on today's agenda we also have four nominations that we'll vote on daniel donahue to serve as the circuit judge on the us circuit court of appeals tenth circuit matthew byrne to serve as judge on the us district court southern district ohio uh christopher nasser to serve as us attorney the northern district of oklahoma the remaining nominee todd blanch was listed for the first time and will be held over for future consideration all three of the nominees who were voting that we're voting on today are highly qualified um wanna go on to a the point about our newest committee member senator graham i speak for all of the colleagues here welcome you as a new member of this committee uh and i hope you know on this committee that for this senator sitting beside senator graham here when he was chairman and also when i've been chairman and then also on the budget committee where he was chairman i sat beside him we worked together on a lot of things and i uh really miss his advice, but more his humor and everything that went with it. All good humor. He was surely a true patriot and a defender of this nation. And all of us, as you know, are deeply saddened by his passing. We're honored to have you here and we're confident that you'll continue to make lindsay very proud serving in his place on this committee and any other committees you're on i wanna go on and speak about uh the hearing that we had last week on acting attorney general blanch regarding his nomination for permanent role uh he demonstrated his ongoing commitment to transparency and rule of law indeed the justice department has thrived under his leadership the nation's murder rate is the lowest it's been in a century the justice department has protected americans at every turn we've seen an increase in violent crime arrests the disruption of terrorist activities and seizure of illegal firearms and controlled substances we've also seen an increase in the arrests of child predators and human traffickers and a massive recovery of missing children lost during the biden years mister blanch has also led major successes in thwarting federal program fraud and ending racial discrimination embedded in our government under the biden administration despite all of the mister blanchard's successes the democratic uh members of the committee and throughout uh the entire senate like clockwork sought to defame him yesterday we saw committee democrats hold what one reporter called quote unquote a shadow form to lodge their attacks against mister plant that description seems appropriate because the democrats has operated in the shadows for years now they're not hiding it some of yesterday's panelists was a former spokesman for special counsel jack smith as my and senator johnson's oversight has repeatedly uncovered time and time again jack smith ushered in a weaponization of government unparalleled in our nation's history so if the people who engaged in the worst partisan warfare this country has ever seen have a problem with todd blanch the american people should take notice because it means mister blanch is doing something right to be clear i don't agree with how mister blanch or the justice department has handled every matter and i've demanded answers and will continue to do so but i'd like to address a few of the recent attacks Some has falsely alleged that Mister Blanch had met with Epstein victims. At the hearing Mister Blanch confirmed that he and other Justice Department officials personally met with more than thirty victims. He also rearranged his schedule to meet with victims present at the hearing that same day. It's clear that Mister Blanch is sincere when he stated quote everyone at the department including myself remains committed to engaging with the victims of death free epstein end of quote many have also criticized mister blanch hmm for president trump's settlement with the irs that settlement promoted purported to establish the infamous anti-weaponization fraud mister blanch has unequivocally stated on multiple occasions before congress and not just on this committee but including sworn testimony before this committee and in multiple court filings across different courts that the fraud that the fund is dead still many of my democratic colleagues have challenged the portion of the settlement that remains intact specifically a release of claims against president trump and his family to be clear their tax information was stolen unlawfully disclosed by a convicted criminal contracting with the irs and a mutual release of claims is as commonplace in a settlement as the paper it was written on. But for those criticizing the scope of immunity afforded to the president and his family who were victims of that crime I ask this, where was the democratic outcry when president biden granted blanket pardons for his own family and associates. Those pardons often offered blanket and prospective immunity for prior crimes. I'd like to read to you now from Hunter Biden's pardon. It was, quote, " a full and unconditional pardon for those offenses against the United States which he has committed or may have committed or taking part in during the period January one, twenty fourteen, through december first twenty twenty four end of quote blanket immunity for any crime whatsoever known or not known that's a fact no future prosecution for conduct covered covering a decade that's a fact president biden issued sweeping decade-long prospective immunity for his entire family and he did the same for political allies like doctor foshee so isn't that self dealing i heard crickets from my democratic colleagues when president biden afforded this widespread unprecedented immunity so spare me the outrage i get it my democratic colleagues don't like president trump they get mad about everything he's done regardless of whatever it is and whether prior democratic presidents did the same thing but thwarting this nomination won't hurt the president it'd hurt the american people who are now safer thanks to mister blanchard's successful leadership senator Durbin

thank you mr. chairman i wanna welcome senator darlene graham to the senate judiciary committee Uh, we all miss your brother and our friend, uh, Lindsey. Uh, I can't tell you how many times we worked together, but it was always a joy. I, I see you bring a little different flavor to the Graham family participation. I don't see any cans of Coke Zero, uh, in front of you and I don't believe your brother would attend any session that didn't include him but thank you so much for being with us and, and, uh, we want to work with you as we worked with your brother. Every meeting of this senate judiciary committee has a necessary starting point, and today was no exception. Before we can talk about anything else, we've gotta talk about Jack Smith. Jack Smith is the political punching bag of the senate judiciary committee. Jack Smith, that special counsel who was looking for foreign influence on American elections, whether there was any wrongdoing with classified documents. Jack Smith, let's go get him. Wouldn't it be interesting if we could just call him before this committee? put him under oath demand the answers well he is offered to come before this committee now i think for six months we wrote to the chairman and said bring him in instead of talking about it bring him in ask these questions under oath and if he purges himself he'll be held responsible but he apparently thinks that he can handle himself and would like to come before the committee we can't do that because we gotta keep punching him and if you gotta punch him and he's already answered the question it's tough so for some reason this majority of the senate judiciary committee would rather punch jack smith verbally before every session than actually get direct answers from him under oath he is still available and he should be called on in that that situation to call this uh agreement that was signed by uh blanche uh when it came to the trump family commonplace that was the word the chairman used commonplace commonplace for the federal government to say to any individual we will forever discharge you from any criminal liability involving the tax code and more uh and to do that and to say that that is commonplace it is far from commonplace it is so unique that a federal judge in florida has spelled out the fact that this was extraordinary treatment and raises serious ethical questions let me also say about blanket pardons uh the president retired the trophy on blanket pardons if you remember his first day in office he pardoned everyone who assaulted the capitol the insurrectionists who came in here uh with the design to tear up this building to assault our police officers and to stop the process of counting the votes in the twenty twenty election they did that eh he had to remove the vice president from the senate chamber uh the secret service thought his uh uh future was in doubt if he stayed there under the circumstances so president trump first day in office in the second term gives blanket pardon to everyone of those insurrectionists for whatever they did assaulting police officers beating them up all the things that they did i don't think that that is uh easily explained or dismissed whether biden was right with his pardons uh i'll leave it to you make your own judgment but to say the president's pardon of these cop beaters somehow excusable because of that is just not the same. I want to take a moment to respond to the claim that Todd Blanch's confirmation hearing Democrats had never criticized the Biden Justice Department actions. This is simply and provably false. When I was chair of this committee, we held regular oversight hearings, a rarity now. The hearings covered the Justice Department, the FBI, and other DOJ components. And I frequently criticized the Justice Department and compelled Department of Justice officials, my own party, to answer for their actions. Take a few examples. I called Biden DOJ officials to testify on the misuse of FISA section seven O two. I called FBI Director Wray to testify about the FBI's mistreatment of Olympic gymnasts who were sexually abused. We had multiple hearings on the implementation of the first step act signed into law by president trump and successfully pushed attorney general garland to bring new leadership to the bureau of prisons in fact before this administration it wasn't unusual for senators of both parties to criticize the justice department and call for the attorney general to maintain his independence from the president during his confirmation hearing republican members lectured merrick garland and they said what we need from our next attorney general the republican said more than anything else independence and the attorney general quote must be willing to stand up to the president my republican colleague said and say no when the office demands it i agree with him but i don't hear that too in this when it comes to this administration attorney general garland bent over backwards to be apolitical he appointed a career prosecutor as independent special counsel to oversee the investigations of the former president and he delegated charging decisions of day-to-day supervision to the special counsel to avoid potential conflicts of interest. Now we have a president who claims, and I quote him, absolute right to do what I want with the Justice Department, end of quote, and is seeking, quote, retribution, his words, against the enemy within. He tweets out orders to the Department of Justice to prosecute his political opponents, and Republicans go radio silent and look at their shoes. i'm old enough to remember when republicans claimed a chance thirty minute meeting on the airport tarmac between former president clinton and attorney general lynch was damning evidence of collusion between obama whitehouse and the justice department thirty minutes on the tarmac but republicans expressed no concern that vice president vance is leading lengthy strategy sessions with todd blanchett and kash patel in the white house situation room on how to protect donald trump from the epstein files scandal everything we heard from todd blanchett is hearing last week and his his response to written questions which my colleague will address indicates that if confirmed as attorney general blanchett will continue to serve the interest of donald trump not the american people he defended his decision to collude with trump's private lawyers to establish a two billion dollar trust slush fund for january sixth cop beaters and give trump his family and his businesses immunity from criminal tax laws he continues to claim that the slush fund is quote dead but refuses to commit any tangible step to insure that it cannot be revived as one committee member senator cornyn pointed out the text to the settlement agreement says only parties to the agreement can modify its terms and trump and his family could sue to enforce the agreement This is contracts one O one, as one of the witnesses in the outside panel yesterday said. Blanch also failed to address the inconsistency between his claims about IRS immunity and the deal's actual language. He claimed the deal applies only to Trump, that's what Blanch told us, his sons and the Trump organization. But the senator from Texas also noted the language of the agreement also covers quote, related or affiliated individuals, close quote. including quote related companies affiliates and subsidiaries it goes way beyond what blanche told us blanche also claimed at the hearing that the immunity order binds only the irs and by extension the treasury but the language of the order covers other agencies or departments and of course if corruption is coming up to bat the crypto boys are surely in the lineup blanche also failed to explain why he gutted doj s crypto crime enforcement while he personally held investments in crypto assets of more than a hundred and fifty thousand dollars allowing the president to rake in one point four billion dollars in crypto windfall in the last year even as americans reported billions of dollars in crypto fraud losses i will have more to say about this deeply troubling nomination next week i yield

yeah before we don't have a corn yes so i'm gonna call on senator whitehouse

yeah thanks very much chairman this is in the nature of a point of personal privilege because in my exchange with uh mister blanch last week um well let me say what i said and let let me tell the committee what his response was here's what i said you've refused to exclude january sixth rioters from your anti-weaponization fund you've refused to put in writing that the slush fund is dead Indeed, you've signaled to allies that payouts are still on track. You've vacated seditious conspiracy convictions against members of the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers. You hired January sixth writer Jared Wise, who'd urged the mob to kill police officers. You scrubbed press releases about January six prosecutions and called the releases partisan propaganda. You denied that Trump encouraged any violence on January sixth. You cleaned house of every attorney who worked on a case related to Trump, and you've bragged that bringing justice to violent rioters meant that, quote, " every one of them was either pardoned or had their sentence commuted", end quote. So that's what I said. Here was how Blanch began his response. "Almost everything the senator just said, and he's protected, he's allowed to lie, but almost everything he just said was absolutely false." And he ended by saying, " So the narrative that the senator just suggested and put on me as something I believe, is absolutely not true. We concluded that exchange by saying, well let's look at the QFRs when you're under oath and we can go through them one by one. Well, we have the QFRs back. As to the question of whether he refused to exclude January six rioters from the anti-weaponization fund, here's the question. Yes or no, when you testified before the Senate Appropriations Committee on May nineteen, twenty twenty six, in response to the question whether individuals who assaulted Capitol Hill police officers are eligible to apply for payments under the anti-weaponization fund, did you say, and I quote, " anybody in this country is eligible to apply if they believe they were a victim of weaponization." Response? Yes. So there's one. To the allegation that he refused to put in writing that the slush fund is dead. Question, yes or no? When you testified before the House Appropriations Committee on June two, twenty twenty six, in response to the question whether you were going to issue a new memo in resending that May eighteen memo establishing the anti-weaponization fund, did you say " I'm not committing to putting anything in writing" and " OK, I'm not committing to doing anything in writing"? Answer again? Yes. Signal to allies that payouts are still on track. Here's the question. Yes or no, on June two, twenty twenty six, after you said the anti-weaponization fund would not move forward, did Stanley Woodward, your subordinate, and the DOJ representative who signed the purported settlement agreement establishing the quote " anti-weaponization fund" tweet were on it, in response to a tweet suggesting that there should be " a weaponization fund that will be available to the victims of the weaponized Biden Justice Department who can prove their claims against the federal government through the federal tort claims act." Again, he said, " As I testified at my confirmation hearing, the fund can only operate through action by the department, namely the appointment of commissioners, the creation of a claims process, the transfer of funds and payments, "At my direction the department will not take these steps." But the point was about the Federal Tort Claims Act, which he again failed to deny, failed to show any falsehood or uh lie on my part. Uh, he vacated seditious conspiracy convictions against members of the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers. Question. On April fourteen twenty s- twenty six did DOJ move to vacate the seditious conspiracy convictions of members of the Proud Boys? Response. On April fourteen, twenty twenty six, the US Attorney's Office for the District of Columbia filed a motion to vacate the convictions of multiple individuals that I believe are the subject of this question. Same question with respect to Oath Keeper as his answer, please see my response to the previous question. Hired January sixth rioter, Jared Wise, who'd urged the mob to kill police officers. Question, did Mister Wise work for DOJ during your tenure as Deputy Attorney General? Mister Wise worked at DOJ during my tenure, although I did not hire him. It would otherwise be inappropriate for me to comment on personnel matters within the Department of Justice. The facts, including emails that we have, show that Wise worked at DOJ from at least May, twenty twenty five through April, twenty twenty six. Mister Blanch was confirmed as the Deputy Attorney General in March, twenty twenty five. The hiring of Mister Wise happened under the tenure of Todd Blanch. It's hard to imagine. that you can say i did not hire him of course the deputy attorney general doesn't hire people personally but that evidently was the point he was trying to make moreover during that time did mister weiss at any point have the title of senior advisor in the office of the deputy attorney general response yes during that time did mister weiss at any point have an email address associated with the office of the deputy attorney general response yes to the scrubbing of press releases and calling them partisan propaganda Question. Did DOJ during your tenure as Deputy Attorney General or Acting Attorney General remove from its website press releases on prosecutions related to the January sixth, twenty twenty one attack on the US Capitol? Response. During my tenure, the Department of Justice has worked to reverse the Biden administration's weaponization of the department. This includes stripping the department's website of partisan propaganda, like the press releases mentioned, confirming the truth of my statement. Denied that Trump encouraged any violence on January sixth. On November fifteenth, twenty twenty three, in the case of United States versus Trump, I asked, did you and other attorneys representing President Trump submit a filing saying, quote, not a shred of evidence suggests President Trump called for any violence or asked anyone to enter the Capitol unlawfully on January sixth. Response, yes. That is one quote from a substantive court filing. Question whether he cleaned house of every attorney who worked on a case related to Trump. QFR. On March twenty-six, twenty-six at CPAC with respect to the prosecutions against President Trump, did you say "there is not a single man or woman at the Department of Justice who had anything to do with those prosecutions"? Yes, that is an excerpt of my remarks. On the same day in response to the question of how many of those investigators have been canned, did you say "over two hundred"? "Over two hundred either left before we came in because they knew it was coming, or were fired or took early retirement. They are no longer employed by this department." Response? Please see my response to the previous question, which was, " Yes, this is an excerpt of my remarks." "On the same day, did you say, and when it comes to the FBI, Director Patel has cleaned house thereto? There isn't a single man or woman with a gun, federal agent, still in our organization, that had anything to do with the prosecution of federal trump." He agrees. He fills in the ellipsis in my QFR, adding, which takes a lot of criticism, especially because of what happened over the past several years, but he agrees with my accurate quotation, uh, with the ellipsis. And lastly, bragged that bringing justice to violent rioters meant that every one of them was either pardoned or had their sentence commuted. Uh, my question involved his March twenty-sixth, twenty-twenty-sixth presentation at CPAC, where he said, and I'm quoting here, " If you look at what happened to the men and women convicted because of January sixth by five PM on January twentieth, every one of them was either pardoned or had their sentence commuted." Response? Please see my response to question eleven A. It is inaccurate to say I bragged. Well, it seems to me that it's a pretty heavy load to come into this committee under oath, and accuse a senator of absolutely false claims, and uh, lying, because I'm protected by the committee. Um, so I wanted to make a record of the fact that when we went through the statement, that he said was a lie, and all falsehoods, he agreed to every single element of that statement, one by one, in his QFRs, except minor details like filling in an ellipsis, or saying that he bragged. None of that amounts to lying. None of that makes the statements the least bit false. I stand by what i said, and i wish this committee held our witnesses to a higher standard of conduct. Thank you, chairman.

thank you um we either we need one more person to ratify the appointment of senator graham to the subcommittees uh and we can't do the nominations until we get all of the members on my side of the aisle here so does anybody wanna speak while we wait and if nobody wants to speak i was going to ask senator graham after we approved her appointments to these subcommittees did you have anything you wanted to say to the committee and if you did now would be a good time to say it

thank you thank you chairman grassley and thank you to ranking member Durbin as well um first i just wanna say that many of you have reached out with your

can i ask you if you can get a little closer to the microphone

yup yup can you hear me

yeah

i just First, I wanna say that many of you have reached out with personal stories that you've shared about Lindsay, and just how much that has meant to me. This has been an incredibly tough week for me, as y'all can imagine. So, uh, the the stories and just how he personally touched everyone has meant so very much to me, and I greatly appreciate it. I've watched my brother over the years serve on this committee. and I know how important he took his role as a member, ranking member, and chairman. I can assure you that I will serve with this this committee with the same level of commitment as he did. For nearly thirty years, I've served the people of South Carolina, so I know how the work of this committee impacts the lives of South Carolinians and Americans across the country. What we do in this room impacts the safety and prosperity of every American. I understand the weight of this responsibility, and I intend to meet it with the same seriousness, integrity, and care that I've brought to every day of my career in South Carolina, to the people of South Carolina. I'm honored to be joining the Senate Judiciary Committee, and I look forward to serving alongside each one of you.

We welcome you and thank you.

mr. chairman uh

please go ahead

if we can't do the business of the committee because members are in another committee and it's unpredictable when they'll leave that committee and come to this one can i suggest that we uh have senator graham's uh issue raised off the floor after the first vote this morning when we're all going to be there and hold over the other business of the committee until the next meeting

uh i can't do that because we will not be able to have the time uh with a two weeks left after this week for the senate to be in session before the august recess to get uh the the new nominee confirmed as attorney general

so what are we gonna do

uh can we have uh the i don't know uh

it's been thirty five minutes into this session i think

it's the same way we we we could uh maybe i better talk to our parliamentarian

ok we should be able to hold them all

um our uh i think what we'll do is i'll i'll make this

i think so

follow up on your suggestion this way because it is kind of rude to people not to be able to be here uh let's wait ten minutes and if we don't we'll see what we can do off the floor so ten minutes from right now we'll stand at ease until ten minutes or people get here active staffs to get their members here

ok

if you wanna get an attorney general approved we gotta have members get here to delay this for the one week when it would delay and we're gonna have to have a quorum to do that that it seems it's impossible because of other committee's meeting and some of them having longer meetings than what they planned to that uh we're going to have to uh uh recess and meet off the floor at the vote of the united states senate and and you know how this place is on thursday when everything shuts down around two o'clock that means the first vote that we have which i guess is about eleven forty five or noon or something like that uh we're going to recess until that point off the floor of the senate

Uh first I wanna reiterate that uh the name and nominee, Carvarets, was listed for the first time and will be held over for the fourth generation. Uh, we'll now turn to the n I thought we were gonna do these uh

Some

estimated

kind of

I'm sorry,

I'm just gonna do the one things first.

okay, we have to do these nominations before we do the committee assignments. Well now it turns to the nomination of John Daniel Donahue, the service service judge.

Excuse me, wouldn't Senator Granson first, but do don't we have to take some added action?

Uh he should he

That's for subcommittee,

is going.

she's not a long committee,

Oh oh perfect, perfect.

I think. Okay.

Uh so uh this is for the circuit judge, the US court of appeals for the sent service and cour court will call the roll.

Mister Cornyn. Aye. Mister Lee. Aye. Mister Cruz. Mister Hawley. Mister Tillis.

Aye.

Which one is better?

Mr. Kennedy.

Aye.

Mrs. Smith?

Mrs. Blackburn.

Yep.

Aye.

Mr. Schmitt.

Aye.

Mrs. Britt.

Aye by proxy.

Oh, sorry. Aye by proxy.

Mrs. Moody.

Aye.

Ms. Graham. Mr. Durbin.

No.

Mr. Whitehouse.

No by proxy.

Ms. Klobuchar.

No by proxy.

Mr. Coons.

No by proxy.

Mr. Blumenthal.

No by proxy.

Ms. Hirono.

No by proxy.

Mr. Booker.

No.

Mr. Padilla.

No by proxy. Novak Roxy.

Mister Schiff.

Novak Roxy.

Chairman Grassley.

Aye.

On this vote, the ayes are twelve, the nays are ten.

Okay, the nominee uh will be uh reporting now to the center floor. Now we uh go to uh Matthew Burns, Mister Chairman. Service Judge in the US District Court for the Southern District, Ohio. Uh, clerk will call the roll.

Mister Cornyn.

Oh. Aye. Uh, did you roll, the roll's already started, let's continue, go.

Mister Lee.

Aye.

Mister Cruz.

Aye.

Mister Hawley.

Aye.

Mister Tillis.

Aye.

Mister Kennedy.

Aye.

Mister Blackburn.

Aye.

Mister Schmitt.

Aye.

Mister Britt.

You got one more after that.

Mister Britt.

Aye.

How about boxing? Oh, aye about boxing.

Mister Moody.

Aye.

Miss Graham.

Aye.

Mister Durbin.

No.

Mister Whitehouse.

No about boxing.

Mister Klobuchar.

No about boxing.

Mister Coons.

No about boxing.

Mister Blumenthal.

No about boxing.

Miss Hirono.

No but proxy.

Mister Booker.

No.

Mister Padilla.

No but proxy.

Mister Welch.

No but proxy.

Mister Schiff.

No but proxy.

Chairman Grassley.

Aye.

Chairman Grassley.

On this vote, the ayes are twelve, the nays are ten.

Matthew Byrne who will be Chairman Grassley, can I just enter some things in the record real quick before everybody runs out of here? Oh. Please, sorry. Um I have a a a a a statement that I don't remember my colleagues with, so I'm gonna enter it in the record. I have multiple letters on the branch nomination and and and other things I like to enter in the record man who Without uh objection,

Got it.

then we earn the right to defend her now. Now we have Christopher Nassar uh for uh US Attorney, Northern District of Oklahoma, talk or call the roll.

Mister Cornyn.

Aye.

Mister Lee.

Aye.

Mister Cruz.

Aye.

Mister Hawley.

Aye.

Mister Tillis.

Aye.

Mister Kennedy.

Aye.

Mrs. Blackburn. Mister Schmitt.

Aye.

Mrs. Britt.

Aye. Oh, aye by proxy. Aye.

Ms. Graham.

Aye.

Mr. Durbin.

Aye.

Mr. Whitehouse.

Aye. I'm proxy.

Ms. Klobuchar.

No, I'm proxy.

Mr. Coons.

I'm a proxy.

Mr. Blumenthal.

No, I'm proxy.

Ms. Hirono.

No, I'm a proxy.

Mr. Booker.

No.

Mr. Padilla.

No, I'm proxy.

Mr. Welch.

I'm a proxy.

Mr. Schiff.

No, I'm a proxy.

Chairman Grassley.

Aye.

On this vote the ayes are seventeen, the nays are five.

Okay, so we we favor re-recording, now we go to the nominee uh the uh u updating subcommittee memberships regarding Senator Graham for this Congress, which has been agreed up on by both sides by voice vote. So those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed say no. The no's or the ayes have it. And

No, just thank thank you and everybody. Thank you. Appreciate it.

Thank you. God bless you. Um, meeting is over. So, okay. Yeah.