Executive Session

Floor Speech

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Mr. PETERS. Mr. President, today, I rise to oppose the nomination of Chad Wolf. Officially, we are considering Mr. Wolf's nomination to serve as Under Secretary for Strategy, Policy, and Plans at the Department of Homeland Security. In that role Mr. Wolf would lead the DHS policy office, an important but little-known part of the Department.

However, that is not the role that Mr. Wolf will actually have. We have recently learned that the President has much bigger plans for Mr. Wolf. The President plans to make Mr. Wolf the next Acting Secretary for the entire Department of Homeland Security. Instead of running the policy office, which has a staff of about 160 people and an annual budget of $35 million, Mr. Wolf will lead all of DHS, the third largest executive agency, with a 240,000-person workforce and a budget of over $75 billion.

Let's be clear, for all intents and purposes, we are essentially about to vote on the confirmation of a new Secretary of Homeland Security, a position responsible for protecting this Nation from a vast and evolving array of threats. Despite the importance of this position and this vote, we have not been given a full opportunity to meaningfully examine Mr. Wolf's ability to take on this profoundly important and challenging role.

Based on my evaluation of his qualifications to serve as Under Secretary, I do not believe Mr. Wolf has the experience needed to lead this critical Cabinet Department.

I would like to recognize that Mr. Wolf does have several years of Homeland Security policy experience. In his current role within the Department's policy office, Mr. Wolf has engaged in productive dialogue with the Homeland Security Committee. In particular, I have personally appreciated his willingness to recognize the growing threat of domestic terrorism and White supremacist violence and the need for the Department to do more to keep our communities safe.

However, Mr. Wolf's tenure as chief of staff to former DHS Secretary Nielsen raises serious concerns about his judgment and, in particular, his involvement in some of this administration's most misguided and harmful policies. As part of the Senate's constitutional responsibility to provide advice and consent, I have repeatedly asked DHS to provide documents directly related to Mr. Wolf's time as Secretary Nielsen's top adviser. However, the Department has failed to comply, leaving Congress without the information needed to fully and fairly evaluate Mr. Wolf's qualifications to serve as Under Secretary, let alone run the entire Department of Homeland Security.

Unfortunately, this disregard for Congress's constitutional role as a check on the executive branch is not an isolated occurrence. Instead, it appears to be a defining feature of this administration.

The Constitution requires that the President's nominees to hold key positions receive the advice and consent of the Senate. The Framers knew this arrangement was necessary to ensure that those who hold the most powerful and influential positions in government are accountable not solely to the President but to Congress and, most importantly, to the American people.

However, this President has shown a willingness to abandon the foundational principle of advice and consent and to test the limits of his legal authority to unilaterally install acting officials of his choosing. This has resulted in far too many critical positions going unfilled.

At the Department of Homeland Security, all three top positions-- Secretary, Deputy Secretary, and Under Secretary for Management have been vacant for more than 7 months, and the President has yet to name a nominee for any of those roles. Other key DHS components have seen temporary leaders come and go for months--even years--without a nominee for the Senate to consider. This President has declared that he prefers ``acting'' officials because it ``gives [him] more flexibility.''

Leadership turnover and acting officials are a part of every administration, but widespread and deliberate reliance on temporary leaders defies the constitutional principle of advice and consent, harms the Department's critical national security missions, and puts the American people at risk. The dedicated men and women at DHS who are working tirelessly to keep our country safe deserve much better. The American people deserve much better.

To his credit, I believe Mr. Wolf recognizes the untenable situation caused by the President's refusal to submit nominees to the Department's highest offices. When asked about the impact of vacancies across the top ranks of DHS, he stated ``I believe having Senate- confirmed leaders in the senior levels of any cabinet agency is a benefit to the morale of the workforce and the success of the agency.''

I continue to urge the President to nominate qualified, principled leaders to lead the Department of Homeland Security. I remain committed to working with my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to carry out our constitutional duty to provide advice and consent by promptly, fairly, and thoroughly vetting the President's nominees. I am also committed to working across the aisle in Congress to ensure that the Department of Homeland Security has the resources and authorities it needs to keep Americans safe and to provide oversight--robust oversight--of the Department's actions and use of taxpayer dollars.

I have sought to fully and carefully weigh Mr. Wolf's qualifications for Policy Under Secretary. Unfortunately, due to the lack of transparency in Mr. Wolf's involvement in very troubling Department decisions, I cannot support his current nomination, much less his elevation to Acting Secretary.

If he is confirmed, I will do my part to support Mr. Wolf and help him be successful in an incredibly important job while also working to hold him accountable. But today, I will be voting no on his confirmation, and I urge my colleagues to do the same.

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