Energy and Water Development and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2016
Floor Speech
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Mr. CARDIN. Mr. President, I thank my colleague from Pennsylvania, Senator Casey, for bringing to the attention of this body the fact that we have not met our constitutional responsibility in the advice and consent of appointments made by the President to the courts.
I think we all understand the challenge on the Supreme Court of the United States, where the failure to hold a hearing on Judge Garland, basically saying the President's term is no longer 4 years but 3 years in an election year, makes no sense at all. We have all been talking about that, but as Senator Casey pointed out, this is now becoming a matter for our district courts.
Let me share with my colleagues. This past week, I went by the U.S. District Court in Greenbelt, MD, and had a chance to talk with some of the judges who were there. They were telling me there is a serious urgency to fill the vacancies on the Maryland District Court. We have two vacancies on the Maryland District Court. One was appointed by the President in March of last year, Paula Xinis, to fill the vacancy. We have a judicial emergency in Maryland. The President did his job in making the nomination in March of 2015. For reasons I don't quite understand, it took 6 months before the Judiciary Committee reported out that nomination, but they did. They reported it out in September 2015, 6 months later. This is not a controversial appointment. It passed by voice vote out of the Judiciary Committee.
Paula Xinis is well qualified. She has clerked for judges. She has a distinguished record in public service, public interest law as well as in private law. I could go through her full record. I have done it before, but Paula Xinis has now been waiting over a year for consideration.
So I am sort of puzzled. Is the Republican leadership now telling us that the term of a President is no longer 4 years but 2 years for the appointment of district court judges? This is a noncontroversial appointment that should have been confirmed well before now and is still on the calendar. As my friend from Pennsylvania pointed out, when we look at the number of actions this Congress has taken on President Obama's appointments--17 confirmations by the Senate--compared to a comparable number in 2008, when the Democrats controlled the Senate and it was in the last 2 years of President Bush's term, 68 nominations were filled in that year.
Currently, we have 20 nominations on the Executive Calendar waiting for action that have been approved by noncontroversial votes of the Judiciary Committee. The number of vacancies has increased in these 2 years from 43 to 79.
I know the distinguished leader is on the floor. I am hopeful we will find a way forward so we can act on some of these nominations.
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Mr. CARDIN. Mr. President, as I pointed out to my colleagues, the number of vacancies has increased during this term from 43 to 79. We have judicial emergencies in our State and many States around the Nation. So I am going to try a smaller number and see whether we can get agreement on that.
307, Xinis; Calendar No. 357, Martinotti; Calendar No. 358, Rossiter; Calendar No. 359, Stanton; that the Senate proceed to vote without intervening action or debate on the nominations in the order listed; that the motions to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate; that no further motions be in order to the nominations; that any related statements be printed in the Record; that the President be immediately notified of the Senate's action, and the Senate then resume legislative session.
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