Prairie State Wire

Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Illinois) stood his ground on the Senate floor in support of President Joe Biden's associate attorney general nominee Vanita Gupta, who has been under scrutiny for her brash behavior on Twitter. 

Gupta serves as president and CEO of the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights. From 2014 to 2017, the nominee was the principal deputy assistant attorney general and head of the Civil Rights Division for the U.S. Department of Justice. 

"The DOJ needs and deserves to have full leadership in place," Durbin said before the Senate on April 14. "Vanita Gupta will be the first woman of color and the very first civil rights attorney to serve as associate attorney general. This historic nominee is exceptionally well-qualified."

Last month Gupta was driven to issue a public apology for rhetoric in tweets that ruffled GOP feathers. 

“I regret the harsh rhetoric that I have used at times in the last several years,” Gupta said according to a March Politico article. "I think the rhetoric has gotten quite harsh over the last several years and I have fallen prey to it. I wish I could take it back. I can’t. I can pledge to you today that if I am confirmed, you won’t be hearing that kind of rhetoric from me.”

A Republican senator from Texas called the longtime civil rights attorney a "polarizing partisan activist" who "failed to receive majority support from the Judiciary Committee."

"I want to be clear the passionate opposition to this nominee is not about politics," Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) said during Gupta's confirmation hearing. "I’ve voted to confirm the vast majority of President Biden’s nominees, my attitude being that he won the election, he's entitled to populate the candid and other important positions with people he has confidence in, but there are limits."

According to Cornyn, it is Gupta's "history of inflammatory public statements, radical policy positions and a laundry list of misleading statements and flat-out lies" that render her unqualified. 

Durbin contradicted Cornyn's complaints in an April 16 column published in Roll Call that defended Gupta as the ideal nominee, citing her "commitment to upholding the rule of law and her willingness and ability to work across political and ideological lines."

"[Gupta's] dedication to building meaningful, lasting partnerships, even with those of a different political party or ideological stripe, will be vital to the DOJ as it works to restore public trust and renew the integrity and independence missing from the Trump era," Durbin said.