Earlier today, the Senate Judiciary Committee considered the controversial nomination of Vanita Gupta to be associate attorney general. The vote on Gupta's nomination ended in a tie. As reported by CNN:

The Senate Judiciary Committee is expected to advance Vanita Gupta's nomination as associate attorney general to the full Senate next week. Hopefully some Senate Judiciary Democrats will reconsider their support.  As Senator John Cornyn points out, Gupta could be the Biden Administration's "most dangerous" nominee to the Department of Justice:

"I still am very concerned about Ms. Gupta's nomination," Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, said, citing her responses to the committee's questions. "She has avoided answering questions, or as in the case of her testimony here in front of the committee, she's completely, 180 degrees -- taken a 180-degrees position different from what she has on a previous occasion as recently as last summer when we had her before the committee [to] testify on police reform."

Today was Biden’s Attorney General nominee Judge Merrick Garland’s hearing.  There was not a lot of substance and listening to the Democrats speak, you would think that former Attorneys General William Barr and Jeff Sessions were the most partisan in history.  Senator Ted Cruz did a great job of pointing out who really was a partisan attorney general, President Obama's Attorney General Eric Holder:

While refusing to comment on individual past AGs, AG nominee nominee Garland agrees that DOJ should not be politicized . And while not explicitly rebuking Holder, he makes clear that AGs cannot act in the fashion that Holder and his successor Lynch are accused of doing. 2/2

— RNLA ⚖️ (@TheRepLawyer) February 22, 2021

.@TedCruz: "Eric Holder described his role as attorney general as being the wingman for President Obama."

Merrick Garland: "I can assure you I do not regard myself as anything other than the lawyer for the people of the United States. I'm not the president's lawyer." pic.twitter.com/R4ifpDmrFO

— Washington Examiner (@dcexaminer) February 22, 2021

Every day in different ways we are reminded that President Biden is no moderate.  Today three groups are fighting back against some of his most extreme nominees.  We wanted to shine the spotlight today on one of those nominees:

A trio of conservative organizations are launching a multi-million dollar advertising blitz aimed at undermining two of President Joe Biden’s high-profile nominees.

The ad buy, first reported by POLITICO, will air across cable news networks in Washington, D.C. and digital platforms starting Thursday. . . .

One $800,000 ad paid for by the Judicial Crisis Network titled “Dangerous Appointee” shows images of violence this summer in cities across America and states where murder rates are on the rise. “Biden appoints Vanita Gupta for a top job in the Justice Department,” the ad says. “She supports defunding the police, led a group that wants to reduce punishments on white supremacists, even terrorists. When our cities burned Gupta could’ve stood for law and order, for victims. Instead she advocated to let convicts out of jail.”

The nomination of D.C. Circuit Judge Merrick Garland to be U.S. Attorney General has been hailed as a moderate pick for the incoming Biden Administration. However, as Hans von Spakovsky pointed out in a Fox News op-ed this past weekend, Garland may have his work cut out for him maintaining the nonpartisan ideals of the Department considering the other individuals that Joe Biden intends to nominate to join him at the Department — specifically, Vanita Gupta and Kristen Clarke.

On Wednesday, former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn's legal team and the Department of Justice filed responses to the inflammatory brief written by Michael Gleeson on behalf of District Judge Emmet Sullivan. Judge Karen LeCraft Henderson referred to Gleeson as an "intemperate amicus" during oral arguments before the D.C. Circuit last week.

During a small Mississippi church's drive-in midweek service during Holy Week, police officers issued $500 citations to all the worshippers for violating the mayor's COVID-19 order.  The worshippers were ticketed despite sitting in their socially distanced cars with their windows up when other people were allowed to pick up food from a drive-in restaurant with their windows down and despite the fact that the Mississippi governor's executive order regarding COVID-19 had specifically allowed religious services that followed social distancing guidelines.  

The church sued and requested a temporary restraining order for violating its rights under the Free Exercise, Free Speech, and Right to Assemble Clauses of the First Amendment, the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, the Mississippi Religious Freedom Restoration Act, and the relevant Mississippi executive orders.  Tuesday, the U.S. Department of Justice filed a Statement of Interest in the case.

A lot people have admitted mistakes, promised reforms or are acting further on the incredible IG report of Department of Justice Inspector General Michael Horowitz.  This weekend former FBI Director James Comey even admitted he was wrong on the basis of the report.  But one person has not budged: the leader of the impeachment efforts for Democrats, House Intelligence Committee Chair Rep. Adam Schiff.  And besides the FBI and Obama Department of Justice, if there is one person who should be admitting he was wrong, it is Rep. Schiff.

It should be noted that much of this was available to Rep. Schiff, who denied it when Intelligence Committee Ranking Member Rep. Devin Nunes came out with a report confirming that the FISA warrants were wrong and based on information known to be false.

Schiff tells Chris Wallace he was unaware of errors and omissions in FBI use of FISA process. Bunk. The much-derided Nunes memo, which Schiff strongly disputed at the time, called attention to these very abuses. Most media, of course, echoed the Schiff version, scoffed at Nunes.

— Brit Hume (@brithume) December 15, 2019

Democrats and the mainstream media have put the nail in the coffin on two key issues of past and future elections.  From two different sources within the Department of Justice, news came today the media may have prematurely closed the book on some very newsworthy issues. 

Christopher Steele, author of the infamous Steele dossier alleging collusion between Trump and Russia, has agreed to speak with U.S. officials about his relationship with the FBI. According to The Hill:

"Republicans have long alleged it was Steele’s dossier that improperly led to an FBI inquiry, which ultimately morphed into special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into possible coordination between the Trump and campaign and Russia during the 2016 election.

The Justice Department’s internal watchdog is investigating aspects of the Mueller probe, including whether officials abused their power when they ordered surveillance of a former campaign aide partially based on information from Steele’s dossier."