Loretta Lynch Confirmed as Next Attorney General

WASHINGTON—The Senate on Thursday confirmed Loretta Lynch as the next attorney general, approving her as the nation’s top law-enforcement official at a time of national debates about police conduct, government surveillance and combating terrorism.

More than five months since she was nominated in early November, Ms. Lynch was confirmed in a 56-43 vote as the first black woman to lead the Justice Department.

The Senate took longer to approve only two other attorneys general before Ms. Lynch, according to the Congressional Research Service. She was confirmed 166 days after President Barack Obama nominated her and will replace Attorney General Eric Holder.

Speaking at a Washington event Thursday, Mr. Obama said “America will be better off” with Ms. Lynch in the job. He noted that one of his priorities is to “rebuild” trust between law enforcement and minority communities, adding that Ms. Lynch has “credibility with law enforcement, but she’s also got credibility with communities.”

A farewell ceremony for Mr. Holder is scheduled for Friday, and Ms. Lynch is expected to be sworn in on Monday.

Five months after a November nomination, Loretta Lynch has been confirmed as the next U.S. 

Attorney General. WSJ's Devlin Barrett reports. Photo: AP

“After this extended delay, I can only hope that Senate Republicans will show Loretta Lynch more respect as attorney general of the U.S. than she has received as a nominee,” said Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont, the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee.

All members of the Democratic caucus and 10 Republicans supported her confirmation.
Ms. Lynch was praised by members of both parties for her work as the top federal prosecutor in Brooklyn, N.Y, but some Republicans criticized her defense of Mr. Obama’s plan to bypass Congress and shield millions of illegal immigrants from deportation.

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Loretta Lynch’s nomination for Attorney General has been through a confusing journey of political maneuvering and partisan politics. Photo: AP

 

“This nominee has given every indication she would continue the Holder Justice Department’s lawlessness,” said Sen. Ted Cruz (R., Texas) on the Senate floor, castigating fellow Senate
Republicans for confirming her. “There are more than a few voters back home that are asking what exactly is the difference between a Democratic and Republican majority when the exact same individual gets confirmed as attorney general.”

Mr. Cruz opposed Ms. Lynch in a procedural vote, but didn’t vote on her confirmation.
Her supporters noted the broad range of law-enforcement and legal groups across the country who had backed her nomination.

Ms. Lynch was approved by the Judiciary Committee in late February, but Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.) delayed her confirmation vote until the Senate resolved an abortion dispute and passed an anti-trafficking bill Wednesday.

Ms. Lynch inherits an office where front-burner issues include the public debate about police misconduct, ongoing probes of Americans suspected of supporting Islamic State, and battles over government surveillance.

“As attorney general, I am sure she will draw upon those childhood experiences and the struggle of her grandparents and great grandparents when addressing the current protests over too many young lives lost in our streets,” Mr. Leahy said.

The Obama administration will also expect her to expand on the work Mr. Holder did in scaling back prison sentences for nonviolent drug offenders.

The sentencing reform measures sought by Mr. Holder who took office in 2009, aren’t universally embraced within the department. While his efforts have halted a decadeslong trend of a rising federal prison population, it will be up to his successors to maintain that effort.

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Timothy Heaphy, who worked with Ms. Lynch as a U.S. Attorney in Virginia, said the sentencing reforms represent “a sea change’’ in how federal prosecutors charge criminal suspects. “We’re on a course, to me, that is healthier and wiser, and I hope and expect that she will continue along that path,’’ said Mr. Heaphy, now at the law firm Hunton & Williams. “I think she will.’’

Current and former Justice Department officials noted Ms. Lynch also will take over the department at a time of intensifying oversight of how the investigative agencies—the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Drug Enforcement Administration, the U.S. Marshals Service, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives—do their jobs. The head of the DEA stepped down this week in the wake of criticism of her handling of a scandal involving agents attending sex parties with prostitutes in Colombia.

Mr. Holder’s six-year tenure as attorney general was marked by pitched battles with congressional Republicans. Despite those disputes, Mr. Holder, who plans to return to a private law firm and speak on criminal justice issues, became one of Mr. Obama’s longest-serving cabinet members.

Among other things, he has been criticized on the left for not filing criminal charges against bank executives after the financial collapse, and on the right for extracting multimillion-dollar settlements from big banks for their roles in the crisis.

Early in the administration, he was rebuffed by Congress in his efforts to empty the controversial prison for terror suspects at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and bring the suspects in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks to trial in New York City.

The low point of his tenure came in 2012 when House Republicans voted to hold him in contempt of Congress in a fight about documents related to a botched gunrunning investigation along the Southwest border.