Prepared Opening Statement by Senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa
Chairman, Senate Judiciary Committee
Executive Business Meeting
Thursday, July 24, 2025
On today’s agenda, we have seven nominations.
We’ll vote on Kurt Wall, Kurt Alme, Lesley Murphy, Jeanine Pirro, Erik Seibert, Nicholas Chase and Daniel Rosen to be U.S. Attorneys.
These are highly qualified nominees.
Two of these nominees have received blue slips from four Democratic senators.
I thank Senators Klobuchar, Smith, Kaine and Warner for working to select qualified nominees.
Their efforts are a testament to the way this process should work. I look forward to supporting them and encourage my colleagues to do the same.
We also have the following three bills listed on the agenda to be voted on:
S. 1038, the TRACE Act;
S. 1098, the Opioid Overdose Data Collection Enhancement Act; and
S. 1528, the CHILD Act of 2025.
The three bills are part of a bipartisan effort to tackle crime and protect vulnerable populations.
Each equips law enforcement and decision makers with critical information either about the last known locations for missing persons, hot spots for drug overdoses or the criminal backgrounds of contractors responsible for taking care of our children.
I want to thank Ranking Member Durbin, and his staff, for working with me to put together this agenda. I’d also like to thank the members of this committee for collaborating on these public safety bills.
Before we turn to the agenda, I’d like to address last week’s meeting, and to share my perspective.
At the beginning of last week’s markup, I announced, “if we haven’t voted before 10:30, I’ll plan to call the vote on all nominations at that time. If people wish to speak after that time, I will stay as long as needed for their remarks.”
I set this time for last week’s vote because of conflicts including a markup in another committee.
My intention was to allow all my colleagues to give their remarks.
That’s why I promised at the very beginning of the meeting to stay as long as necessary so everyone – Republicans and Democrats – could be heard on the nominations.
My colleagues didn’t take me up on that offer.
Instead, I was surprised with a motion that was not on the agenda and not previewed in advance of the meeting.
And when I tried to call the vote, some of my colleagues accused me of not allowing them to speak and stormed out of the room instead of allowing the vote to proceed and then taking as much time as they needed afterwards to give their remarks.
This may have been the result of miscommunicated intentions between our sides, but this isn’t a good way for the committee to operate, and it’s not how I want things to work moving forward.
Since last week’s meeting, my staff has had productive conversations with the Ranking Member’s staff.
We’ve heard each other’s concerns, and I believe we both agree that we want the committee to run well. I think that we can work together to make sure this happens.
For those who haven’t read them, under the Senate Rules, the Chairman can end debate with a majority vote of a majority present of the committee.
This has been used by Chairmen of both sides on multiple occasions and is always controversial when it happens.
We can argue about whether this instance or that instance was justified or not, but I don’t think that would be productive.
It’s unsurprising that Republicans and Democrats both tend to think they’re justified when their side does it.
The important point is, I agree this shouldn’t be a common practice, and I don’t intend to use it unless the consideration of nominees is being unfairly obstructed.
So, moving forward, I’ll work with the Ranking Member to ensure that we allocate sufficient time for debate, and I’ll ask the Ranking Member to work with me to ensure that we can navigate the Senate schedule and the Senate’s two-hour rule to ensure that we can vote on nominees when they’re on the agenda.
As Chairman, I’ve tried to be fair to all members of the committee, even during controversial nominations.
In February, during a markup for Director Patel, I held the meeting open and sat here in silence for an extended period of time as a courtesy to Senator Schiff, so that he could arrive in time to speak in opposition to the nomination.
I look forward to working with the Ranking Member and my colleagues to ensure that we can allow for robust debate in committee, while also ensuring that nominees receive a vote when they are ready for consideration by this committee.
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