Mazie Hirono, the U.S. senator from Hawaii, is demanding that Senate Republicans abandon “a partisan script” and confirm Loretta Lynch as attorney general.
Hirono, who spoke to reporters at the Capitol along with three colleagues, pointed out that Lynch’s confirmation has been stalled longer than the confirmations for the last five AGs combined — all because some GOP senators “want to win a ideological battle on choice.”
That battle played out in a Senate vote Tuesday, when most Senate Democrats voted to block an anti-human trafficking bill over its abortion restrictions — “prolonging an impasse that threatens to further delay a vote” on Lynch, as Politico reports.
The vote was 55-to-43, with Hirono and Hawaii Sen. Brian Schatz helping to keep Republicans short of the 60-vote threshold to advance the bill.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said Senate Democrats are kowtowing to “left-wing lobbyists” by “tanking the trafficking legislation over the abortion language,” says Politico.
But Hirono says the legislation is “totally unrelated” to the Lynch nomination.
If confirmed, Lynch would be the first African-America woman to serve as AG.
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About the Author
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Chad Blair is the politics editor for Civil Beat. You can reach him by email at cblair@civilbeat.org or follow him on X at @chadblairCB.