Attorney General nominee Loretta Lynch was quizzed by Republicans on immigration, marijuana and even polygamy on Wednesday during a Senate Judiciary Committee confirmation hearing.
Lynch, the U.S. attorney in Brooklyn, New York, is President Barack Obama’s pick to succeed Eric Holder at the helm of the Justice Department — and in a post that has increasingly become fraught with political controversies.
Just weeks after taking majority control of the Senate, Republicans praised Lynch’s qualifications but used the hearing to prod her on a number of their top complaints with Obama’s administration.
The panel’s chairman, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), opened with questions about the legality of Obama’s move to forestall some deportations — and several other Republicans joined him. Lynch batted those questions away, sticking to legal arguments and noting that the Department of Homeland Security actually carries out many immigration enforcement policies.
She said she’d reviewed the department’s legal analysis of Obama’s immigration moves, and said: “I don’t see any reason to doubt the reasonableness of those views.”
Sen. Lindsay Graham raised the Supreme Court’s looming decision on the constitutionality of same-sex marriage and asked Lynch to explain the legal argument against polygamy.
The South Carolina Republican also asked about the Justice Department’s decision to allow states to legalize marijuana, even though use of the drug is against federal law. She responded that she support’s the department’s focus on efforts like preventing marijuana edibles from falling into the hands of children.
And Graham asked Lynch whether she supports the death penalty, to which she responded: “I believe that the death penalty is an effective penalty.”
Noting the hearing’s broad variety of topics, Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) said, drawing laughter: “You’re not Eric Holder, are you?”
Lynch began the hearing by vowing to improve the relationship between the Justice Department and Congress.
“I look forward to fostering a new and improved relationship with this Committee, the United States Senate, and the entire United States Congress — a relationship based on mutual respect and Constitutional balance,” she said “Ultimately, I know we all share the same goal and commitment: to protect and serve the American people.”
Lynch has overseen high profile financial fraud cases against banks, terror cases including one against a would-be New York subway bomber, and the corruption case against a former GOP congressman. At the same time she has held a lower profile than others who vied for the attorney general nomination, which the White House hopes is an asset in nomination hearings.
Holder is a friend of the President and he often endured battles with Republicans over various controversies related to President Obama’s policies. These ranged from the President’s plans to close the Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, military prison to the decision to stop defending federal laws banning recognition of same-sex marriages.
After years in the Senate minority, unable to fully control investigations of alleged misdeeds by Holder, Republican senators are using the Lynch hearings to replay certain controversies.
Grassley included among witnesses in the second part of Lynch’s hearing in Thursday a former CBS reporter who spent years reporting on the botched “Fast and Furious” gun operation.
“Fast and Furious” was a gun probe run by agents from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives intended to target cross-border gun traffickers. The agents allowed thousands of firearms to be purchased by suspected traffickers, many of which ended up in the hands of cartels in Mexico. Two were found at the scene of a border firefight with traffickers that killed a U.S. Border Patrol agent.
Holder denied wrongdoing in the three-year controversy over the operation and he was vindicated by a Justice Department inspector general probe.
But Grassley and other Republicans are still fighting to obtain thousands of documents the White House withheld from a House GOP investigation.
In his opening statement, Grassley said in the public’s confidence that the Justice Department can do its job without the influence of politics has been “shaken with good reason” in recent years.
“I, for one, need to be persuaded that she’ll be an independent attorney general,” Grassley said of Lynch.
The panel’s top Democrat, Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont, said Lynch’s “qualifications are beyond reproach,” pointing to her two Senate confirmations as U.S. Attorney.
“She’s brought terrorists and cybercriminals to justice. She’s obtained convictions against corrupt public officials from both parties,” he said, adding that she’s worked to improve law enforcement relationships with the communities that they serve.
And he prodded Republicans to keep the hearing focused on Lynch’s qualifications, rather than a broad list of complaints with Obama’s administration.
“I hope we all remember that she is the nomination for attorney general — and that’s why I’m focusing on her,” he said.
Some Democrats raised war-related issues. Lynch told Leahy that she considers waterboarding to be torture, “and thus illegal.”
Holder has grappled with how to defuse tensions between police and minority communities, in the wake of police shootings of black men and boys.
Lynch noted her good relationship with law enforcement and vowed to help heal the rifts between police and communities they serve.
“Few things have pained me more than the recent reports of tension and division between law enforcement and the communities we serve,” Lynch says in prepared remarks. “If confirmed as Attorney General, one of my key priorities would be to work to strengthen the vital relationships between our courageous law enforcement personnel and all the communities we serve.”
Lynch was introduced by New York’s two Democratic senators. Sen. Chuck Schumer called her a “nose-to-the-grindstone type” who “packs a powerful punch.”
Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand called Lynch “one of our country’s most accomplished and distinguished women” involved in law enforcement in the United States.
At the hearing supporting Lynch were about 30 friends and family members — including members of her sorority, Delta Sigma Theta, who were clad in red.
Barring any surprises, Lynch is likely to be confirmed — rejecting her means Republicans would continue the tenure of Holder, who many in the GOP have pushed to resign.