President Biden’s pick to lead the Justice Department, Merrick Garland, said Sen. Ben Sasse’s questions concerning the Constitution during his confirmation hearing were “really tough.”
“Is congressional inaction a legitimate basis for Article 2 to decide it just must act because it wishes policy were different and legislation doesn’t move? Therefore, you have a pen and a phone. Can you just act because Congress didn’t?” Sasse asked Garland on Monday.
“You’re asking really tough questions of our basic constitutional structure,” Garland responded, who has served as the chief judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.
.@BenSasse:”Is congressional inaction a legitimate basis for Article II to decide it just must act…?”
Garland:”You’re asking really tough questions of our basic constitutional structure…
Doing so simply out of upset that Congress hasn’t done what you want,obviously not ok.” pic.twitter.com/IOoU0Oia2f
— Washington Examiner (@dcexaminer) February 22, 2021
“Doing so, simply out of [being] upset that Congress hasn’t done what you want, obviously not OK,” he continued. “The president does have authorities. When he acts consonant with Congress, he’s at his highest power. When Congress has not acted at all, he’s left with only his own power, which is clearly available under the Constitution, depending on the circumstance that we’re talking about.”
GARLAND SAYS HE’LL BE ‘UNITED STATES’S LAWYER,’ AS CRUZ HITS HOLDER FOR ‘WEAPONIZED’ DOJ
Garland’s nomination to serve as attorney general comes after former President Barack Obama nominated him for the Supreme Court after the death of Justice Antonin Scalia. The Senate’s Republican majority at the time refused to consider the nomination.
During his hearing on Monday, Garland vowed to be “the lawyer for the people of the United States” and said that he’s “not the president’s lawyer” during an exchange with Texas Sen. Ted Cruz.
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“I don’t want to comment on any individual’s conduct [or] any of my predecessors’ or FBI directors’ conduct in any way. But I can assure you, I do not regard myself as anything other than the lawyer for the people of the United States,” he said. “I am not the president’s lawyer. I am the United States’s lawyer, and I will do everything in my power, which I believe is considerable, to fend off any effort by anyone to make prosecutions or investigations partisan or political in any way. My job is to protect the Department of Justice.”
