Senate leaders Wednesday reached a deal to allow the nomination of James Cole to be Deputy Attorney General to come to the Senate floor and be voted upon.
In a unanimous consent agreement, Democratic and Republican leaders also agreed to vote on the nominations of Virginia Seitz to be Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Counsel and Lisa Monaco to be national security Assistant Attorney General.
Senate Republicans have blocked Cole’s nomination from coming to the floor; he currently serves in the job under a recess appointment.
Senate leaders reached the agreement after hammering out various issues with the Justice Department, including concerns Sen. Charles Grassley, the top Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, had about his ability to effectively investigate Operation Fast and Furious, a controversial Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives gun smuggling program, Beth Levine, a spokeswoman for the senator, told Main Justice.
Grassley has expressed frustration that he did not receive the records and documents that House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) got from the Justice Department concerning the program which allowed guns to fall into the hands of Mexican drug cartels in an effort to track them. Assistant Attorney General Ronald Weich of the DOJ Office of Legislative Affairs wrote in a May letter to Grassley that the DOJ will not provide the senator with access to documents that were made available to the House Oversight Committee because federal agencies usually respond to committee chairmen and Grassely is not one.
But Attorney General Eric Holder now has said the Department will give the senator the same access to information, witnesses and documents that is provided to Issa and the DOJ Inspector General, which also is probing the program, according to Levine. In return, Republican senators removed holds on the nominees, she said.
Votes on the nominees have yet to be scheduled. A representative for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Main Justice on the schedule for the votes.
