Hillary Clinton confirmed for Cabinet, but Eric Holder delayed

Her confirmation was held up for a day by Sen. John Cornyn (R- Texas), who wanted to further air the issue of the charitable activities of Clinton's husband, former President Bill Clinton. Cornyn voted to confirm Clinton.

The Clintons had reached a detailed agreement with Obama's staff providing for disclosure of contributions to Bill Clinton's foundation.

Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee, saying they still want to question Holder about his role in some controversial Clinton-era clemency cases and other matters, delayed his confirmation vote for a week.

Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) grudgingly agreed to the one-week delay. Republicans who initiated the move included Charles Grassley of Iowa, Jon Kyl of Arizona, Jeff Sessions of Georgia and Cornyn.

"I am extremely disappointed, but they have that right," Leahy said, after saying Holder's confirmation was too important to postpone. "The threats confronting the country are too serious to delay this."

The request was made by the ranking minority member on the committee, Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, after a morning meeting of the GOP senators on the panel, which oversees the Justice Department and is charged with investigating attorney general nominees for their readiness and ability to serve.

Specter said that he was acting at the request of his fellow Republicans and that he personally was reluctant to hold up the confirmation process, preferring instead to question Holder about his own concerns in a private meeting that is scheduled for sometime in the next few days.

Specter and other GOP senators said Holder has not fully answered their many questions about his role in several controversial clemency cases, in part because Holder's questioning had been rushed by the Democrat-controlled committee.

"The proceedings did not lend themselves to the kind of questioning I thought was necessary," Specter said.

Senate confirmation of Holder, a well-respected former judge and prosecutor, is not considered to be in jeopardy, according to several sources on the committee, and some Republican senators, such as Orrin Hatch of Utah.

But the Republicans have accused Leahy and other Democrats of trying to ram through Holder's confirmation, in part by cutting off the questioning of him about his role in Bill Clinton's last-minute pardon of fugitive financier Marc Rich. They are also concerned about his role in Clinton's commutation of long prison sentences for 16 convicted members of two Puerto Rican nationalist groups that committed terrorist acts in the 1970s and 1980s.

Some of the senators said a Jan. 9 report in The Times raised significant questions about Holder's role in the so-called FALN clemencies. The Times article included reports that Holder pressured subordinates at the Clinton Justice Department to effectively change the department's recommendation from one of vehement objection to support, and that when Holder continued to encounter stiff opposition from his own pardon attorney, he sought to a neutral recommendation.

That neutral stance allowed Clinton to issue the controversial clemencies -- even though law enforcement officials were virtually unanimously opposed -- without appearing to go against the wishes of the Justice Department.

Specter has also accused Leahy of blocking GOP efforts to subpoena two former senior Justice Department officials who had objected to the Rich pardon and the FALN clemencies -- including pardon attorney Roger Adams -- after they refused to testify under oath willingly. And he said Leahy, as chairman, has refused to support GOP efforts to get cartons of pertinent documents relevant to Holder's time as deputy attorney general from the Justice Department and Clinton White House archives.

josh.meyer@latimes.com

paul.richter@latimes.com