WASHINGTON: Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions fervently rejected “damnably false” accusations of past racist comments Tuesday as he challenged Democratic concerns about the civil rights commitment he would bring as Donald Trump’s attorney general. He vowed at his confirmation hearing to stay independent from the White House and stand up to Trump when necessary.
Sessions laid out a sharply conservative vision for the Justice Department he would oversee, pledging to crack down on illegal immigration, gun violence and the “scourge of radical Islamic terrorism” and to keep open the Guantanamo Bay prison in Cuba.
But he also distanced himself from some of Trump’s public pronouncements. He said waterboarding, a now-banned interrogation technique that Trump has at times expressed support for, was “absolutely improper and illegal.”
Though he said he would prosecute immigrants who repeatedly enter the country illegally and criticized as constitutionally “questionable” an executive action by President Barack Obama that shielded some from deportation, he said he did “not support the idea that Muslims, as a religious group, should be denied admission” to the U.S., as had been touted by Trump in his campaign.
Nothing new came out of the hearing that seemed likely to threaten Sessions’ confirmation by the Republican Senate.
Yet as he outlined his priorities, his past — including a 1986 judicial nomination that failed amid allegations that he’d made racially charged comments — hovered over the proceedings. Protesters calling Sessions a racist repeatedly interrupted and were hustled out by Capitol police.
Sessions vigorously denied that he had ever called the NAACP “un-American.” He said he had never harbored racial animus, calling the allegations — which included that he had referred to a black attorney in his office as “boy” — part of a false caricature.
“It wasn’t accurate then,” Sessions said. “It isn’t accurate now.”
He said he “understands the history of civil rights and the horrendous impact that relentless and systemic discrimination and the denial of voting rights has had on our African-American brothers and sisters. I have witnessed it.”
Sessions also vowed to recuse himself from any probe into Hillary Clinton, whom he’d criticized during the campaign.
Homeland Security
As the Judiciary Committee questioned Sessions, another Senate panel conducted hearings on Trump’s choice to lead the Department of Homeland Security.
Retired Marine Corps Gen. John Kelly told members of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee that he favors building a wall to secure the border with Mexico but that alone won’t be enough.
Kelly said in a questionnaire to senators that if confirmed, his top priority would be stopping the “illegal movement of people and things.”
Kelly’s confirmation is almost assured, senators from both sides said.
Vaccine skeptic
Meanwhile, in a move that alarmed pediatric experts, Trump met in New York with Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a vocal skeptic of childhood vaccines.
Trump “has some doubts about the current vaccine policies,” Kennedy said, adding that Trump might create a panel to investigate. Claims linking vaccines to autism have long been debunked.