The Senate Judiciary Committee also approved the nomination of Senator Jeff Sessions to be attorney general in a straight party-line vote. Jeff Sessions’s confirmation has also faced widespread protests over his opposition to the Voting Rights Act and his history of making racist comments. On Monday, about 10 members of the NAACP, including President Cornell William Brooks, were arrested at a sit-in at Sessions’s office in Mobile, Alabama. At Sessions’ Senate confirmation hearing in January, protesters wore white, hooded robes and pretended to be members of the Ku Klux Klan. Sessions once reportedly said he thought the Ku Klux Klan was “OK until I found out they smoked pot.” On Wednesday, a protester from the group CodePink disrupted the Senate Judiciary Committee’s meeting.
Sen. Chuck Grassley: “The nomination is approved by the committee and will be a report—will report to the floor. Meeting over.”
CodePink protester: “Shame! Shame! Shame! You have furthered the nomination of a man who will not protect the vulnerable. That’s why we have an attorney general, to protect the vulnerable.”