Warren, All Committee Democrats Vote Against Advancing Trump HUD Nominee Scott Turner After Failure to Provide Committee with FBI Background Check
Ranking Member Warren was Prepared to Support Turner’s Nomination
Rushing Turner’s Confirmation Vote Without FBI Background Check Broke with Committee Practice
Washington, DC – U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Ranking Member of the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs, and all Committee Democrats voted against advancing President Trump’s nomination for Secretary of Housing and Urban Development following the White House’s failure to complete Scott Turner’s FBI background check in advance of the Committee vote. Warren noted she was prepared to support Turner’s nomination, but Committee members simply do not have the information they need to vote on it. Before the hearing, Senator Warren and all Committee Democrats wrote to Chair Tim Scott urging him to postpone the vote until the FBI background check is complete.
If confirmed, Mr. Turner will serve as a member of President Trump’s cabinet and be in the line of presidential succession. The Committee’s customary practice – followed by both Republican and Democratic chairs – is to hold a vote on a nomination only after the FBI completes its background investigation. Warren also noted that the Senate Armed Services Committee, the Senate Committee on Agriculture, and the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee have all delayed holding hearings on nominees, even before reaching markups, because their FBI background checks were not complete.
See Senator Warren’s full remarks below:
Senator Elizabeth Warren: Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you for your remarks.
Mr. Chairman, last week, I told you and other members of this committee that I am willing and eager to work with you in a bipartisan way, and I think that's true for every single Democrat on this committee.
I think one of the areas where we have a lot of room to work together is on efforts to bring down housing costs for American families. And we started that effort last week when the Committee held its confirmation hearing for Scott Turner, President Trump's nominee to head up the Department of Housing and Urban Development.
I have some concerns about his nomination, but I was encouraged that Mr. Turner acknowledged our housing supply crisis and his commitment to work together to address it. Our housing shortage is the single most important factor driving too high housing prices, and as I said in my opening statement last week, we are not building enough housing in this country, and that is one of the core reasons that housing prices are so high.
So, I came here prepared to be able to vote in favor of his nomination, and I appreciate his willingness to respond to my questions and to meet with me—ready to go. But Mr. Chairman, we are missing one important piece of information for Mr. Turner, and we should not move forward without it.
To date, neither you nor I have received Mr. Turner's FBI background check or had a chance to review it. Now, everyone must remember that if confirmed, Mr. Turner will serve as a member of President Trump's cabinet and be in the line of presidential succession. There is no reason to anticipate a problem, but it would be irresponsible for this committee to vote on a cabinet nominee without his background check, and it would not be consistent with committee precedent.
The Committee's customary practice, followed by both Republican and Democratic chairs, is to hold a vote on a nomination only after completion of the FBI background investigation and receipt of a briefing on it.
Under Chairman Brown, nominees received a committee vote only after their background check was complete.
We know that, just in the past few days, including last night, that the Armed Services Committee, the Ag Committee, and the Veterans Affairs Committees have all put off holding hearings—not just final votes—but hearings on nominees because their FBI background checks were not complete.
Now, we're not looking for a delay here. As soon as the FBI gets its act together and gets over here and tells us—and I understand from the Chairman that that should be right away—as soon as we have that hearing and can get briefed on it, assuming there are no problems, we're ready to go forward.
There are nominees already stacked up on the floor. We're not trying to delay this vote by a single minute, but we are in the minority, and we're asking that for all of us, we have this baseline principle in this committee, as evidently it is recognized in other committees, and that is: We don't go forward without the FBI background check.
I am mystified as to why you would not agree to this delay. It need not be long. It serves both sides of the aisle, and the American people are served by knowing that that background check has been completed. Absent this background check, we simply do not have the information that is needed to go forward on this nominee.
So, I will be voting no, and I hope that with future nominees, you will adhere to committee precedent, and the common sense practice and courtesy of ensuring that we have the full FBI background check for any nominee before we hold a committee vote.
###
Previous Article