Following the Republican filibuster of Sec. of Defense nominee Chuck Hagel, a shocked Harry Reid (D-NV) said he was going to call Hagel and apologize over the fact that the confirmation had been stopped.
They are filibustering him. That’s what they are doing. And I’m going to call him Chuck Hagel when I finish here and say, “I’m sorry, sorry that this happened. I’m sorry for the president, I’m sorry for the country, and I’m sorry for you, but we’re not going to give up on you.”
Reid then repeated the same approach he’d taken when he had tried to shame Republicans into avoiding a filibuster to begin with: “If this is not a filibuster, I’d like to see what a filibuster was. The first time in the history of our country that a secretary of Defense has been filibustered successfully, and probably ever filibustered.”
There will now be approximately 10 days till Hagel’s confirmation is taken up again. Reid said he hopes “nothing happens in the next ten days that we won’t have a secretary of defense.”