Democrats are wasting "their time and their ammunition" trying to stall the confirmation of Sen. Jeff Sessions as President-elect Donald Trump's pick for U.S. attorney general and are merely attempting to save face after a punishing election, John Sununu tells Newsmax TV.
"I think from a purely political point of view, I'm not too upset that the Democrats are going to waste their time counting on the wrong issues," the former governor of New Hampshire and chief of staff to President George H.W. Bush said Monday to Steve Malzberg on "America Talks Live."
"Because this thing is going to get through the Senate, this confirmation will get through and they will have wasted their time and their ammunition. They're licking their wounds from an election that docked the heck out of them.
"They're trying to find some place to hang on to. This is … a party that has no idea what it's all about anymore. It's trying to resurrect itself from the eyes of the public but really is not doing a very good job of it."
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Sessions has been dogged by racist comments he allegedly made as a U.S. attorney in Alabama. He was said to have called a black assistant U.S. attorney "boy" and the NAACP "un-American" and "communist-inspired" — remarks he denies. But in 1986, he withdrew from consideration for a federal judgeship.
"All the allegations are old and they have come from a witness that's been discredited. There's 30 years since those days. Jeff Sessions has a public record. He's going to put on the table. He's proud of it," Sununu said.
Democrats have accused Trump's transition team with trying ram through his cabinet picks before they are properly vetted.
Sununu is author of the book "The Quiet Man: The Indispensable Presidency of George H.W. Bush," published by Broadside Books.
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