Listening to Chuck Grassley congratulate himself for the way he and the Republicans treated Merrick Garland while Garland has to sit patiently and listen makes me want to throw things across the room.
I am old enough to remember when @ChuckGrassley held up Merrick Garland's nomination to the DC Circuit for more than a year—in 1995, that is.
A reminder to Republican senators that Garland is (a) smarter than you are and (b) has sat on hundreds of oral arguments interacting with oral advocates who are better than you. He will be low key & polite. He always is. But you're not gonna trip him. You're not that formidable.
Merrick Garland, in his first answer, is sounding a lot like @kathleen_belew.
On the Durham investigation, in response to Grassley question, Garland says he has no information about the investigation, says he will meet with Durham, and that he has no reason to think it was not correct to let Durham investigation continue. He does not make commitments.
Similarly, he does not commit to releasing Durham report, though he says he is a big believer in transparency.
Grassley notes that his answers are not entirely satisfying.
Grassley notes that his answers are not entirely satisfying.
On the death penalty, in response to a Grassley question about pending death penalty cases, Garland says he cannot comment on pending cases as a sitting judge.
In response to question on Hunter Biden case, Garland says he has had no conversations with the president about it. And he says that in all of their conversations, Joe Biden has insisted that investigative and prosecutorial decisions will be left in the hands of the Justice Dep.
Sheldon Whitehouse asks Garland how he plans to assess the damage the department sustained: Garland says he will look to OPR and the OIG and similar procedures.
Whitehouse now asks about DOJ and FBI not answering questions submitted by committee members over the past four years. Asks Garland to find out who ordered the questions not answered and to go through the backlog of unanswered questions. Garland says there will be no policy of...
...being unresponsive. He wants the department to be as responsive as possible and to, if it cannot answer, at least explain why. He commits to trying to address the backlog. Asks Whitehouse to prioritize and specify order given the size of the backlog.
Cornyn says he thinks the attorney general is the toughest job in the government. He is wrong. Deputy attorney general is the harder job.
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