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Sen. Ted Cruz and Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Dick Durbin traded verbal blows in a fiery back-and-forth during the confirmation hearing for Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson Wednesday, leading the Texas Republican to tell Durbin “you can bang” the gavel “as loud as you want.”
As Cruz honed in on Jackson’s reasoning for sentencing child sex offenders near the end of his 20-minute period and called on her to answer his questions, Durbin banged the gavel to indicate his colleague’s time has expired.
“You have taken over a minute of my time,” Cruz told Durbin (D-Ill.).
“You have been given extra time, you usually ask for it,” the chairman snarked back.
The two continued talking over each other for several moments, with Cruz accusing Durbin of interrupting and Durbin calling on Cruz to “play by the rules.”
The Texan then declared that he was going to continue questioning Jackson and told Durbin “if you want to testify, you’re welcome to.”
“You’re not recognized, senator,” Durbin shot back.
“You don’t want her to answer that question?” asked Cruz.
“You wouldn’t allow her …” said Durbin as Cruz interrupted.
“Mr. Chairman, she may answer the question. I’ve asked her why she sentenced Stewart …” Cruz said, as Durbin broke in.
“You’ve gone over the time, senator, by two minutes and a half,” he said.
“Because you’ve interrupted me for two minutes, Mr. Chairman,” an exasperated-sounding Cruz said.
“Will you allow her to answer the question or do you not want the American people to hear why with someone she described as an egregious –” Cruz began before Durbin cut him off.
“Chairman Durbin, will you allow her to answer the question?” Cruz pleaded
“You won’t allow her to answer the question,” Durbin said before recognizing Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.) to begin his time with Jackson.
“Why do you not want the American people to know what happened in the Stewart case? Or any of these cases? Chairman Durbin, I’ve never seen the chairman refuse to allow a witness to answer a question,” Cruz said as Durbin pounded the gavel several more times.
“You can bang it as loud as you want,” Cruz said.
“I can just tell you at some point you have to follow the rules,” Durbin replied.
“Chairman Durbin, apparently we’re very afraid of the American people hearing the answer to that question here in the Senate,” Cruz said before relenting as Coons began his questioning.
A short time later, Los Angeles Times photographer Kent Nishimura tweeted a photo he had taken of Cruz looking at his phone during the hearing.
“He was searching twitter for his name,” Nishimura captioned the image, adding it was taken “right after his exchange with Chairman Durbin.”
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