Prepared Opening Statement by Senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa
Chairman, Senate Judiciary Committee
Executive Business Meeting
Thursday, June 12, 2025
Good morning. On today’s agenda, we have seven nominations. The nominations of Bart Davis and David Metcalf to be U.S. Attorneys are listed for the first time, and will be held over.
We’ll vote today on the nominations of Stanley Woodward, to serve as Associate Attorney General; Elliot Gaiser, to serve as Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Counsel; Joseph Edlow, to serve as the Director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services; John Squires, to serve as the Director of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office; and Ronald Parsons to be U.S. Attorney for South Dakota.
These are all highly qualified nominees, and I look forward to advancing them today.
We’ll also vote on S.1829, the STOP CSAM Act, which will increase protections for kids online.
This has long been among my highest priorities. One of the first hearings we held this Congress was on children’s safety in the digital era. And for the past several years, our Committee has taken multiple bipartisan steps to strengthen protections for children online. This problem has gotten worse with the advance of developing technologies, not better. And big tech companies too often drag their feet or look the other way, as children are being harmed on their platforms.
That’s why I’m glad we’re marking this bill up today. It takes direct aim at the terrible spread of online child sexual abuse material—and gives law enforcement and victims stronger tools to fight back.
The bill strengthens reporting, increases accountability, and supports the victims who live with these crimes every day. It doesn’t fix everything, but it’s a strong step in the right direction.
We’ve worked tirelessly to bring together a broad coalition of different stakeholders to support the bill. And the bill draws from multiple perspectives, but meaningfully addresses the root problems. I urge my colleagues to support it, and look forward to moving it out of Committee today. I also anticipate that we’ll have future opportunities to mark up additional legislation in this space.
Next, I want to take a moment to address recent calls from the other side urging the Justice Department to address threats against judges. I share this concern, and encourage the Justice Department to take every step in its power to protect judges, prosecute threats against them and to ensure their safety.
Given our shared concern about judicial security, I’m disappointed that Democratic leadership is blocking the confirmation of the Director of the Marshals Service and the head of the Justice Department’s Office of Legislative Affairs. The Marshals Service is responsible for protecting judges, and the Office of Legislative Affairs is responsible for providing Congress with information about Justice Department efforts to combat threats.
My Democratic colleagues can’t say they stand for judicial security, while blocking the confirmation of officials who have a role in judicial security.
I also think we should care about threats and violence against our brave law enforcement officers. In Los Angeles, violent rioters have attacked and assaulted federal agents, they’ve destroyed police cars, they’ve burned American flags and they’ve vandalized an American city. Why are they doing this? Because federal agents were enforcing the laws of our country.
Democrats have been constantly warning us about the importance of following court orders. Yet, we’ve learned that the violence in Los Angeles was in response to federal agents enforcing at least four federal search warrants. Surely my colleagues agree that those court orders should be followed?
The violence in Los Angeles is not happening in a vacuum. As I warned at our hearing for these nominees only a few weeks ago, Democrats are encouraging this lawlessness. Many have called for defunding or even abolishing federal law enforcement agencies.
They’ve made inflammatory attacks against these federal law enforcement agencies.
The Democratic nominee for Vice President called them “Trump’s modern-day Gestapo.”
The House Democratic Leader recently called for revealing the identities of federal officers, comparing them to agents of the Soviet Union.
These violent agitators in Los Angeles didn’t emerge by happenstance. They’re acting on dangerous rhetoric, which has real consequences for federal officers trying to do their jobs.
I hope that Democrats will see the danger of vilifying our federal law enforcement officers, and will treat threats and violence against them with the same justified seriousness that they take threats against judges.
Turning to another matter, since August 2021, I’ve raised concerns about the Biden Administration’s failure to vet Afghan evacuees.
On Tuesday, the Justice Department Inspector General released a report confirming again what I’ve been trying to get across and the Biden administration refused to acknowledge.
The report showed that the Biden administration let dozens of Afghan evacuees into this country who had “hits” on a terrorist screening database.
This report is consistent with two Department of Homeland Security Inspector General reports. Those reports showed major vetting failures.
This data had been hidden from the public by the Biden administration.
I appreciate the Trump administration working with the DOJ Inspector General to make it public.
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