Volume 167, No. 216 covering the 1st Session of the 117th Congress (2021 - 2022) was published by the Congressional Record.
The Congressional Record is a unique source of public documentation. It started in 1873, documenting nearly all the major and minor policies being discussed and debated.
“Unanimous Consent Request--Executive Calendar (Executive Calendar)” mentioning the Environmental Protection Agency was published in the in the Senate section section on pages S9175-S9176 on Dec. 15.
More than half of the Agency's employees are engineers, scientists and protection specialists. The Climate Reality Project, a global climate activist organization, accused Agency leadership in the last five years of undermining its main mission.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
Unanimous Consent Request--Executive Calendar
Mr. WARNER. Mr. President, I rise today to seek unanimous consent to confirm Amanda Howe, President Biden's nominee to be the next Assistant Administrator for Mission Support at the Environmental Protection Agency.
I believe that my friend Senator Lee is going to object to this consent request. I hope when he does that he will explain his objection to this extremely qualified nominee.
I have known the nominee for more than 20 years and can speak directly to her talents and abilities. Amanda held a number of roles in the Commonwealth of Virginia, including serving as my assistant secretary of commerce and trade during my 10 years as Governor.
Amanda also served then-Governor Kaine's administration and Governor McAuliffe's administration and has held other leadership positions, including serving as deputy and then acting chief of staff to Mayor Bill de Blasio in New York.
Amanda led the planning and organization of the Queen's visit to Virginia in 2007, when we celebrated 400 years of connection to the UK. She helped plan the first-ever ticker tape parade for the U.S. women's soccer team to celebrate the first World Cup victory. She organized Pope Francis's visit to New York.
Beyond being a talented operator, Amanda also possesses a wealth of knowledge on issues under the EPA's purview, having worked on roles focused on renewable energy.
Amanda has been nominated to lead the EPA's Office of Mission Support, which directs the Agency's efforts to improve efficiency, coordination, and customer experiences for internal and external stakeholders and the public, including the protection of EPA's facilities and other assets nationwide that are terribly important to our government; IT management, for example, inside the EPA.
It is my strong belief that Amanda has the requisite knowledge, expertise, and experience to carry out these critical functions at EPA.
I am also very proud of the fact--and I thank the chair and ranking member of the EPW committee--that she got passed out on a voice vote.
Now is the time to confirm Amanda so she can begin to oversee these critical management activities at the EPA.
So I, therefore, ask unanimous consent that the Senate consider the following nomination: Executive Calendar No. 560, Amanda Howe, of Virginia, to be Assistant Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency; that if confirmed, the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate; that no further motions be in order to the nomination and the President be immediately notified of the Senate's action.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Is there objection?
The Senator from Utah.
Mr. LEE. Mr. President, reserving the right to object, I made communication with the EPA as to how to resolve a concern that I have. It should be an easy thing to resolve. I am waiting to hear back a response from them. In the meantime, I object.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Objection is heard.
The Senator from Virginia.
Mr. WARNER. Will the Senator yield for a question?
Mr. LEE. Sure.
Mr. WARNER. It is my understanding your concern with the nominee is not about the nominee's qualifications.
Mr. LEE. It relates to a matter at the EPA.
Mr. WARNER. Thank you.
I thank the Senator from Utah.
Mr. President, I do hope this matter is resolved. I believe Amanda needs to be installed and doing her job. She has been up for this nomination literally for months.
I also feel this is just one more example--I think probably every Member of the Senate, including the Presiding Officer, has a number of individuals he supports. I know many of my colleagues on the Republican side have nominees they support. The kind of blanket holds that are taking place on way too many of our nominees means that this President can't put in place his team.
The Presiding Officer was a Governor. He is about to be replaced by another Governor. I was a Governor. I can't imagine running an administration a year into my term if I didn't have two-thirds of my appointees serving in office.
The Presiding Officer, I know--I will end very briefly--is an extraordinarily valuable member of the Intelligence Committee. We see America's national security concerns on a daily basis. Those national security concerns will be better met when every major nation in the world has an American Ambassador. It is great that we have State Department personnel, but without that Ambassador in these offices--
Amanda is not up for ambassadorship, but there are a host of Ambassadors in critical nations that need to be confirmed.
I hope--as we wind down these last few days of this session before the end of the year, I implore my friends on the Republican side, give these folks who have waited for months and months and months a kind of assurance of their ability to serve, especially when they are noncontroversial. Please remove their objections. Stop objecting. Let's let the government have these people, personnel in place. I hope Amanda Howe will be one of those. I look forward to my friend from Utah resolving this issue.
I thank the Presiding Officer for listening to my extra 5 minutes.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Hickenlooper). The Senator from Iowa.
Alerts Sign-up