Thanks to a GOP Senator, Obama’s ‘Far Left’ Pick Confirmed to Head Library of Congress
Conservative critics of President Obama’s nominee to head the Library of Congress were blindsided Wednesday when a key Republican engineered her lopsided confirmation by the full Senate despite concerns she is, in the words of one opponent, “an unqualified, far-left progressive.”
The Senate voted 74-18 to confirm Carla D. Hayden, who leads Baltimore’s public library system, as the 14th librarian of Congress.
Sen. Roy Blunt, R-Mo., rushed Hayden’s nomination to the floor even as Blunt’s office declined to answer The Daily Signal’s inquiries Wednesday morning about the status of the nomination.
Critics said Hayden falls short of the scholarly credentials traditionally expected of the nation’s librarian of Congress.
However, Blunt, chairman of the Rules and Administration Committee, scheduled a June 9 committee vote that recommended Hayden’s confirmation to the full Senate.
“Hayden has made a name for herself in the far-left community as a radical activist,” the conservative group Concerned Women for America wrote Blunt and the committee before that vote. “This position is not one for radical activism, but for academic honesty and integrity.”
Before the Senate vote, Hans von Spakovksy, a senior legal fellow at The Heritage Foundation, called Hayden “an unqualified, far-left progressive.”
“Republicans should be very concerned about what her confirmation …read more