Race creeps into stalled vote on nominee for attorney general







By Sari Horwitz April 17 at 6:48 PM   

African American and other civil rights leaders infuriated over the stalled confirmation vote on Loretta E. Lynch, the first black woman to …
Attorney-general nominee Loretta Lynch’s confirmation hearing took place in January. The full Senate has yet to vote on the nomination. (Andrew Harnik/For The Washington Post)

 

African American and other civil rights leaders infuriated over the stalled confirmation vote on Loretta E. Lynch, the first black woman to be nominated for attorney general, are casting the delay as an issue with racial overtones.
They are urging the Senate to act immediately and end a process that has now lasted more than five months.
Activists across the country are three days into a hunger strike over the Senate’s failure to vote on Lynch. African American groups have also protested outside the offices of senators who oppose her leading the Justice Department. And one Democratic senator has compared the holdup to the treatment of civil rights activist Rosa Parks in the segregated South, saying that Lynch has been “asked to sit in the back of the bus when it comes to the Senate calendar.”

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