Watch live wednesday at 2 30 p. M. Eastern on cspan 3, online at cspan. Org or listen live on the free cspan radio app. Next, a hearing on the federal governments role in protecting workers during the coronavirus pandemic. Good morning. The subcommittee on work force protections will come to order. Welcome, everyone. I note that our quorum is present. I note for the subcommittee mr. Courtney of connecticut, mr. Levine of michigan, mr. Castro of texas, dr. Roe of tennessee, mr. Guthrie of kentucky, mr. Smucker of pennsylvania, mr. Banks of indiana, mr. Watkins of kansas, mr. Mercer of pennsylvania, mr. Johnson of south dakota, mr. Cellar of pennsylvania are all permitted to participate in todays hearing with the understanding that their questions will come only after all members of the subcommittee on work force protections on both sides of the aisle who are present either in person or via remote participation pursuant to House Resolution 965 and the accompanying regulations thereto hav
Ukraine investigate former Vice President joe biden in exchange for military aid. It is just under 2. 5 hours. [crowd noise] the committee will come to order. Thank you for attending today. Today, we will hold the nomination hearing on important position. The nominee today is John Jay Sullivan to be the u. S. Ambassador to the Russian Federation. We have two distinguished colleagues of ours. We will allow them to proceed with introductions. I will postpone my opening statement. I asked the Ranking Member to do likewise. Until the nominees have been introduced. We are glad to be joined today by senators dan sullivan of alaska and ben cardin of maryland. Sullivanand senator has drawn the straw to go first. Thank you very much. Its an honor to be before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee again on behalf of my friend John Sullivan. To beport his nomination the United States ambassador to the Russian Federation. Despite what his last name would suggest, we are not related. Although i oc
Have Agency Counsel in the room. We learned we cannot even review the transcripts. I want to see the transcripts democratic staff have to be in the room and i want to review transcripts. It is so petty from the democrats yesterday they had the bench out where we sit the staff cannot even be there or have a place to sit. It is finally reached a boiling point and the member said they are so frustrated at the idea they cannot be a part of this to see what is going on. s we are at a standstill and we will see what happens. But the idea to review a transcript to sit through all of these depositions to sign in and out on specified times this is just one example of the ridiculous things we have had to live through. And the members have had it. They want to be able to see to represent their constituents to find out what is going on. That his chairmanships call. We are getting into that substantive part of it but it doesnt change those fundamentals we have seen the call transcript and ambassado
Committee will come to order. Today, we will hold the nomination hearing on a very important position. The honorable John J Sullivan to be the ambassador to the Russian Federation. First, we have two very distinguished colleagues of ours who wish to introduce our nominees. Torefore, i am going postpone my Opening Statement and i ask the Ranking Member to do likewise. Beh that, we are glad to joined by senators sullivan of alaska and cardin of maryland. Sullivan thank you very much, mr. Chairman, Ranking Member menendez. It is an honor to be in front of the committee again in front on behalf of my friend John Sullivan to support his nomination to be the United States ambassador to the Russian Federation. Despite what his last name would suggest, we are not related, although i regularly joke with senator markey who is also a proud sullivan member in his heritage that at some point in history, we will probably all related. I have supported secretary sullivans nomination before and can spe
Comports with any of the democrats impeachment narrative. Not one thing. I will say this, the process mr. Schiff has set up, mr. Schiff was going to try to limit members from asking questions when we started todays interview. The fact that he wont let Agency Counsel state Department Counsel dissipate, i participated many of us with the Oversight Committee have participated in countless number of transcribed interviews. We have never ever had an occasion where Agency Counsel was not allowed to participate where there were limitations put on our staff who could be there to assist in the interview and we have never seen a chairman suggest that members are not allowed to ask questions. If this is how mr. Schiff will conduct these interviews in the future, that is a concern. Ambassador volker has been impressive and has said nothing that coincides with what the democrats are saying with their impeachment narrative. Has volker testified to evidence we are not going to get into has what he sa