Opening Statement Of Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.),

Chairman, Senate Judiciary Committee,

Executive Business Meeting

November 1, 2007

 

Yesterday, as Senators were considering the answers to their questions for Michael Mukasey, I announced a special markup for next Tuesday to consider that nomination.  This is in addition to our already heavy workload of hearings, and our regular, weekly business meeting on Thursday next week.  I apologize to the Members for imposing this additional burden during a very busy time for all Senators.  I thank all Members for their cooperation. 

 

My hope is that by scheduling the consideration for next Tuesday, Senators will have an opportunity to consider the recently received written responses from the nominee and will be prepared to debate the nomination and vote.   The White House called after I announced the markup to thank the Committee for scheduling the matter as we did. 

 

We had an important hearing yesterday and have limited time to focus on proposals to amend the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) during the next several days.  I commend the Senators who participated yesterday in what was a good hearing, and especially thank Senator Feinstein for sharing the responsibility for chairing.   It is my hope that working together, we can be prepared to turn our attention to that matter next Thursday.

 

To do all this, we need to make progress on the agenda we have before us this week.  We have other important executive nominations, a circuit court nomination, corruption legislation, cybercrime legislation, human rights legislation, and courts legislation, which Senators have been working on in a bipartisan way for a long time, on today’s agenda.  It is a full agenda.  I hope we can make progress on it and clear the decks so that next week we can turn to the Mukasey nomination and the FISA legislation. 

This morning the Committee has another opportunity to consider the bipartisan “Public Corruption Prosecution Improvements Act of 2007.” Senator Cornyn and I introduced this bill to strengthen and clarify key aspects of federal criminal law and provide new tools to help law enforcement combat public corruption nationwide.  I thank Senator Sessions for working with us and cosponsoring this legislation.  I include in the record the letter of support from the Department of Justice and a letter of support from a number of public interest organizations including the Campaign Legal Center, Common Cause, Democracy 21, the League of Women Voters, Public Citizen, and U.S. PIRG.

We have circulated a substitute that incorporates some formatting changes suggested by the Department of Justice and a clarification inspired by Senator Specter – to make clear that accepting a token item like a baseball cap in compliance with Senate Rules is not a criminal violation.  I also double checked to be sure that nothing in this bill makes campaign contributions into gratuities.
 

Congress took an important step in restoring Americans’ faith in their elected officials earlier this year by passing long-awaited ethics and lobbying reforms.  But rooting out the kinds of rampant public corruption we have seen in recent years requires us to go further, and to give law enforcement the resources it needs to effectively investigate and prosecute public corruption crimes.  Congress must send a strong signal that it will not tolerate corruption and provide better tools for federal investigators and prosecutors to combat it.  Our bill will do exactly that.  

It gives investigators and prosecutors more time and resources to effectively enforce existing anti-corruption laws. 

The bill extends the statute of limitations for the most serious public corruption offenses. 

 

It would also provide significant and much-needed additional funding for public corruption enforcement. 

The bill goes further by amending several key statutes to broaden their application in corruption and fraud contexts.  This series of fixes will prevent corrupt public officials and their accomplices from evading or defeating prosecution.  And it raises the statutory maximum penalties for several statutes dealing with official misconduct, including theft of government property and bribery.
 

If we are serious about addressing the kinds of egregious misconduct that we have recently witnessed in high-profile public corruption cases, Congress must enact meaningful legislation to give investigators and prosecutors the tools and resources they need to enforce our laws.  I hope all Members will join Senator Cornyn, Senator Sessions, and me in supporting this bill so that the Committee can promptly report it to the Senate.
 

We also have an important cybercrime bill on the agenda that is sponsored by Senators Specter, Durbin, Grassley, Biden, Hatch, Schumer and me.  This bill also has the endorsement of the Department of Justice. We have an amendment that has been circulated and has bipartisan support.  I hope we can report that bill today.
 

I understand that there will be a request to hold over the Grassley-Schumer Sunshine in the Courtroom Act and a request to hold over the Durbin- Coburn- Feingold-Brownback bill to try to work something out with Senator Kyl.  That bill grows out of a hearing Senator Durbin held earlier this year in the Human Rights Subcommittee.  It would make forcing children to serve in a military role a crime and creates extraterritorial jurisdiction to combat it.