“Postponing Judge Garland’s trial endangers our national security,” Durbin wrote. “The Attorney General oversees a number of components and agencies of the Department of Justice that are essential to protecting the homeland from threats to foreign and domestic.”
Durbin said that while his committee worked with Republican counterparts to plan Garland’s trial, they encountered an “obstacle that unnecessarily delayed his confirmation.”
Durbin added that he was “willing to take other steps to expedite the Senate’s discussion of Judge Garland’s appointment if his trial were not to continue on February 8” in the absence of GOP cooperation.
Biden told the committee on Jan. 6 that he plans to appoint Garland as attorney general. Garland is the former chief justice of the U.S. District Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. He was also President Barack Obama’s choice for the Supreme Court in 2016, but his nomination was blocked by the GOP-controlled Senate.
The Senate Legal Affairs Committee received the paperwork from Garland last week. The committee usually has 28 days between receiving the paperwork from the nominee and confirming the trial. But Durbin recently told reporters he was trying to reach an agreement with Republicans to shorten the time.
In his letter Monday, Durbin argued that a hearing on Feb. 8 “provides enough time to review the judge’s record,” adding that it would take place 13 days after the committee received paperwork, “the same time between the receipt of then Judge Amy Coney Barrett’s [committee questionnaire] and her trial on nomination in the Supreme Court. ”
Confirmation hearings for attorneys general recently lasted two days, with the nominee testifying the first day and experts from outside the second.
Once the Senate approves the organizing resolution, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) will become the top Republican on the committee.
Spokesmen for Graham and Grassley did not immediately comment.