WASHINGTON – With Jeff Sessions, Donald Trump has nominated the most extreme candidate for Attorney General in modern history. DNC Interim Chair Donna Brazile issued the following statement before today’s Senate confirmation hearings begin:

“As our nation’s top law-enforcement officer, the U.S. Attorney General bears a sacred responsibility to fight injustice and defend the defenseless. Senator Sessions’ extreme views are directly at odds with the mission of the office he seeks.

“Over the course of his career he has called protections for people with disabilities ‘dangerous’ and unnecessary. He has fought against women’s rights and women’s equality, voting against paycheck fairness, the Violence Against Women Act, voting to defund Planned Parenthood, and questioning the constitutional legitimacy of Roe V. Wade. He said he does not believe that grabbing women by their genitals against their consent is sexual assault.

“Sessions has fought against voting rights and celebrated the gutting of the Voting Rights Act, which he called ‘intrusive.’ He helped block reforms in prison sentencing, attacked civil rights activists in court, and has a long history of making discriminatory and racially charged remarks. He has fought against LGBT rights, voting against the Employment Non-Discrimination Act to allow workplace discrimination based on sexual orientation. He even likened his effort to ban same-sex marriage to the movement to abolish slavery.

“Sessions is worse than unqualified for the job – he stands for everything our Attorney General should be fighting. Still more troubling is the fact that the Senate is rushing to hold this and other confirmation hearings before the Office of Government Ethics has finished reviewing the candidates’ financial and ethics information, increasing the likelihood that they could be compromised by their business ties or personal past.

“Thirty years ago, the Senate rejected Sessions’ appointment to a federal judgeship because he was deemed too extreme then. If they confirm him now, Republicans will be turning back the clock on all the progress we’ve made as a nation. Donald Trump could not have nominated a worse candidate.”

###