Statement Of Sen. Patrick Leahy In Scheduling Judiciary Committee Consideration Of The Nomination Of Michael Mukasey

October 31, 2007 -- "The Judiciary Committee has an important hearing today and a full agenda for our previously scheduled meeting tomorrow. I hope we can make progress of these matters. We have a limited time to focus on proposals to amend the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act that require our attention for the next several days. We have other executive nominations, a circuit court nomination, corruption legislation, cybercrime legislation, human rights legislation, and courts legislation that Senators have been working on in a bipartisan way for a long time.

With that important work in mind, I am asking Senators who are members of the Judiciary Committee to attend a special markup to consider the nomination of Michael Mukasey to be Attorney General of the United States in addition to our already heavy workload and normal weekly business meetings. The extra session would be next Tuesday, November 6. I am sorry to impose this additional burden during a very busy time for all Senators, and I thank them for their cooperation. My hope is that by scheduling the consideration for next Tuesday, Senators will have an opportunity to consider the recently received written responses from the nominee and will be prepared to debate the nomination and vote. "

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Source: Senator Patrick Leahy