Bush Calls Senate Reviews ‘Search and Destroy’ Missions
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WASHINGTON — President Bush said yesterday the way the Senate reviews his picks for the federal bench has become so partisan and mean-spirited that qualified candidates decline because they don’t want to go through a confirmation hearing.
The hearings too often turn into “search and destroy” missions that ruin a person’s reputation, Mr. Bush said in a speech to hundreds attending the 25th anniversary gala of The Federalist Society, a conservative legal group.
“When the wife of a distinguished jurist proudly attends his hearing and is brought to tears by ugly and unfounded insinuations that her husband is secretly is a bigot, we lose something,” Mr. Bush said.
Mr. Bush was referring to the confirmation hearing of Justice Alito in January 2006 when his wife, Martha-Ann Bomgardner, left in tears after withering questions from Judiciary Committee Democrats.
Offering Justice Alito a chance to defend his integrity, Senator Graham, a Republican of South Carolina, asked him whether he was a “closet bigot.”
“I’m not any kind of bigot,” Justice Alito, who attended the dinner with his wife, replied.
Mr. Bush complained that the Senate has failed to act on many of the nominees who have agreed to serve. He said senators are imposing a new standard in which nominees who have support of the majority of the Senate can be blocked by a minority of obstructionists. “As a result, some judgeships go unfulfilled for years,” Mr. Bush said. “This leads to what is called judicial emergencies — vacancies that cause justice to be degraded or delayed.”