The Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday approved by voice vote the nomination of Kathryn Keneally for the top tax-enforcement post at the U.S. Justice Department, sending the nominee to the full Senate for consideration.
Keneally, whom President Obama nominated in September, is a New York-based partner at Fulbright & Jaworski, where tax law is among her specialties. The Tax Division assistant attorney general nominee also is an officer of the American Bar Association's taxation section.
She is Obama’s second nominee for the job. From 2009 to 2010, Republicans blocked his first nominee, Mary Smith, conveying concerns about her lack of tax law experience. Smith now serves as counselor to Assistant Attorney General Tony West of the DOJ Civil Division.
Keneally “is obviously much more qualified for this position than the president’s previous nomination,” said Sen. Charles Grassley of Iowa, the top Senate Judiciary Committee Republican.
But the senator said his support for the nominee in committee does not indicate a pledge to help move her nomination on the Senate floor. He expressed frustration with the DOJ’s efforts to work with him on his probe of a controversial Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives gun trafficking investigation called Operation Fast and Furious.
Nathan Hochman, a partner at Bingham McCutchen, was the most recent Senate-confirmed leader of the Tax Division. He left the DOJ at the end of the George W. Bush administration.
The tax position is one of two vacant assistant attorney general posts. The Antitrust Division assistant attorney general job opened in August when Christine Varney joined Cravath, Swaine & Moore.
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