Less than two hours after starting, Kash Patel’s Senate confirmation hearing skewed off the rails, with Republicans and Democrats both shouting down Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA).
The incident started with a line of questioning from Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), pressing Patel about a line of controversial statements President Donald Trump‘s nominee for FBI director has made in recent years.
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Patel dodged Klobuchar’s questions before noting to Grassley that Klobuchar had run over the allotted amount of time for the first round of questioning, seven minutes.
“You’ve got a second round,” Grassley told Klobuchar, but before he could call on another senator for questioning, she cut back in.
“Could he just answer the question?” she demanded. “I deserve an answer to that question.”
Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) suggested that senators running over their allotted time should have it subtracted from their allotment for the second round of questioning, which Grassley denied before adding, “Sometimes it’s faster to get things done here, just letting people shout.”
Still, Grassley was again interrupted, this time by a Republican, Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA).
“If we’re going to start this, I want an extra three minutes,” Kennedy complained.
“So what you’re saying is the chairman wasn’t a very good chairman by not shutting her up,” Grassley snapped back. “But I’ve gone through this before, and I think I know how to handle it.”
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“I think you’re star-spangled awesome,” Kennedy said. “But if you’re going to let someone over there go three minutes over, I want my three extra minutes.”
Patel’s hearing can be seen in full below.