Democrats: DeVos didn’t provide ‘anywhere close to satisfaction’ on our questions
Betsy DeVos, the Michigan billionaire President Trump tapped as his education secretary, delivered answers Monday to the more than 1,000 questions put to her by Democrats on the Senate education committee, just one day before the panel is set to vote on her confirmation. The Democrats said they were not satisfied with her responses on critical questions.
The Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions is set to vote on her confirmation at 10 a.m. Jan. 31, a week later than it was originally scheduled. On Monday, Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), the ranking member of the committee, urged the chairman, Republican Sen. Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, to delay the vote again, but Alexander declined.
The DeVos nomination has become as controversial as any of Trump’s Cabinet picks. Her supporters see her as a champion of school choice. Critics say her advocacy in education proves she wants to privatize public education.
The pitched battle over her nomination intensified over the weekend and Monday. Supporters began running paid advertisements on the Internet urging the Senate to confirm her, while critics rallied on Capitol Hill to oppose her and more calls against her surfaced. More than 1,400 members of the community at the elite Williams College released a letter objecting to her confirmation, saying that her refusal to “support federal policies regarding educational systems that receive public funding” was disqualifying.
During her Jan. 17 confirmation hearing before Alexander’s committee, she failed to show an understanding of some key education issues, and Democrats later submitted questions to her to answer before the vote. Alexander moved the committee vote from Jan. 24 to Jan. 31 to give her time to answer the questions.
Democrats asked her, according to Alexander, 837 follow-up questions, some of them with several parts, amounting to a total of 1,397 questions. DeVos delivered the answers at about 10:30 a.m. Monday, about 24 hours before the vote. Democrats on the committee were not impressed.
Murray’s office released this statement:
Here are Betsy’s DeVos’s answers to 139+ questions from Democratic Sen. Murray“After an initial review of the responses sent to Committee members with less than twenty four hours before the scheduled vote, staff has identified a number of critical questions about Ms. DeVos’ financial disclosure to the Committee and other areas that have not been answered to anywhere close to satisfaction. Senator Murray does not believe that members of the Committee have enough information about Ms. DeVos’ opaque finances, conflicts of interest, and other Democrats: DeVos didn’t provide ‘anywhere close to satisfaction’ on our questions - The Washington Post:
Here are 139 questions — some of them with a number of parts — that Sen. Patty Murray (Wash.), the highest-ranking Democrat on the Senate Education Committee, asked Betsy DeVos, the Michigan billionaire nominated by President Trump to be U.S. education secretary.
On Monday morning, DeVos delivered answers to more than 800 questions to Democrats on the committee who had posed queries to her after her performance at the Jan. 17 confirmation hearing, at which she displayed little knowledge of key education issues.
You can read more about the confirmation here. Below are the questions Murray asked her and DeVos’s answers.
Murray’s QFRs (3) by Valerie Strauss on Scribd
Here are Betsy’s DeVos’s answers to 139+ questions from Democratic Sen. Murray
