Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) says that the confirmation of Sonia Sotomayor is a great day for the United States Supreme court. She goes on to say that the confirmation sends young women the message “yes I can.”(0:21)
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) defended the decision to deny seating Illinois Senate appointee Roland Burris on the basis of a 1884 piece of legislature that requires the signatures of both a governor and secretary of state on a senator’s credentials before allowing them in the Senate.
Burris, who was recently tapped to fill President Elect Barack Obama’s Senate seat by embattled Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich (D-Ill.), did not have the signature of the secretary of state.
“If you don’t know anything about this, it doesn’t look very good,” said Reid during a press conference with Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), and Patty Murray (D-Wash.) on the Democratic agenda.
“We’ve seen time and time again in print, and electronic media, the crude language of Blagojevich saying ‘this is a effing gold mine, I have to get everything I can out of it’, how were we supposed to react?”
Reid went on to say that the Senate would not move forward until it is entirely clear that Blagojevich acted properly by appointing Burris.
“Until we remove the cloud from this Blagojevich nomination we cannot move forward, and I think it’s a pretty easy hurdle to get over,” stated Reid.
On Tuesday Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) said that there was legal precedent for seating Burris, a notion that Reid dismissed.
“I think Dianne…didn’t get all the facts.”
In a hearing before the Senate Appropriations Committee, Senator Feinstein questioned Attorney General Mike Mukasey about a Department of Justice Office of Legal Counsel memo allegedly arguing that the 4th Amendment’s prohibition of warrantless, unreasonable searches and seizures. Mukasey responds that his statement that the 4th Amendment applies “across the board” is not newsworthy, saying that his understanding of the memo is not that it argued the 4th Amendment did not apply. (0:40)
In a hearing before the Senate Appropriations Committee, Senator Feinstein questioned Attorney General Mike Mukasey about a Department of Justice Office of Legal Counsel memo allegedly arguing that the 4th Amendment’s prohibition of warrantless, unreasonable searches and seizures. Mukasey initially avoided answering by saying that he was unaware of any domestic military operations, but he then said that the 4th Amendment applies “across the board.” (0:41)
The Senate Committee on Rules and Administration held a hearing today on “In-Person Voter Fraud: Myth and Trigger for Disenfranchisement?”
Chairwoman of the committee Diane Feinstein (D-CA) opened the hearing by briefly reminding the committee of the nation’s history of preventing citizens from voting. She said that poll taxes, literacy tests, and requirements to own property were among the most “egregious” forms of this. She said that the committee was holding the hearing to decipher whether or not contemporary forms of voting fraud was prevalent enough to cause concern.
The issue of requiring voters to present photo IDs at polling stations in order to cast a ballot was extensively discussed and revealed a stark partisan divide between Republican proponents of the policy and the Democrats who expressed opposition to such a measure. Only three states–Georgia, Indiana, and Missouri–have passed laws requiring voters to present government-issued photo IDs at polling stations, but Feinstein said that Congress must take a step back and study cases of voter fraud before rushing to pass legislation requiring photo ID to vote. She said that 11% Americans old enough to vote have never been issued government-ID which could potentially prevent 21 million Americans from voting.
Ranking member of the committee Senator Bob Bennett (R-UT) disagreed with Feinstein and cited several instances of voter fraud that he said were causes for concern. But Senator Charles Schumer (D-NY) rebutted telling Bennett that not a single case of voter fraud that he mentioned–including a case from the ’70s–could have been prevented by a law requiring voters to show photo-IDs.
