As a fight over abortion funding in the Senate delays the confirmation of Loretta Lynch as the next attorney general, opposition to her once assumed confirmation is growing.
Lynch was supposed to be confirmed this week, but Senate Democrats are holding up the vote over an abortion fight on a human trafficking bill. She needs the support of at least four Republicans to be confirmed, and the delay is putting her confirmation in jeopardy. (RELATED: Senate Dems Pick Abortion Fight Over Trafficking Victims)
Republican Sens. Lamar Alexander and Bob Corker, who have been on the fence about supporting Lynch, announced Tuesday they would not support her nomination, because of her apparent support of President Barack Obama’s executive order granting illegal immigrants work permits.
“The job of the U.S. attorney general is to enforce federal laws as written, not as the administration wishes they were written,” Corker said in a statement explaining why he would not vote for her.
During her confirmation hearings, Lynch said she has read the Department of Justice’s legal opinion on Obama’s executive order, and concluded the order was lawful. And she said everyone in this country has a “right and obligation” to work, regardless of their legal status. (RELATED: Lynch Says Law Hinders Illegal’s ‘Right’ To Work)
“This is an opportunity, within the Senate rules, to express my disapproval of the president’s abuse of executive authority, and it’s an opportunity I intend to take,” Alexander said in a separate statement Tuesday.
U.S. Civil Rights Commissioner Peter Kirsanow warned the Senate not to damage its own credibility by confirming an attorney general who indicates support of an unconstitutional order in a letter to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell Tuesday.
Kirsanow told McConnell Lynch’s stated support of Obama’s executive order granting millions of illegal immigrants work permits disqualifies her as an attorney general nominee, and cautioned McConnell that the Senate would damage its own authority by confirming a nominee who does not uphold the Constitution.
Kirsanow pointed to a recent federal ruling against Obama’s executive order as further evidence it was not lawful, and said Lynch’s indicated support of the law disqualifies her as a candidate for the nation’s top law enforcement officer. (RELATED: Obama’s Secret Amnesty Faces New Judicial Investigation)
“To countenance a usurpation by the executive branch of the legislative branch’s authority and support millions of people breaking the law should disqualify any nominee from being the nation’s chief law enforcement officer,” he wrote in the letter, obtained by The Daily Caller News Foundation. “Such support does profound and self-evident damage to the rule of law.”
“No less damaging to the rule of law would be Senate confirmation of an Attorney General nominee who has expressed support for unlawful actions,” he added. (RELATED: Jeff Sessions: Why Conservatives CAN’T Confirm Loretta Lynch)
Kirsanow urged McConnell to demand a definite statement from Lynch that she will faithfully enforce immigration laws “as written by Congress.” Otherwise, he wrote, the Senate should not confirm her.
McConnell has said he will not hold the confirmation vote until Democrats allow a vote on the human trafficking bill.
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