Hatch, Schumer among busiest senators
Posted: Tuesday, July 14, 2009 12:58 PM by Domenico Montanaro
Filed Under:
Congress
From NBC's Ken Strickland
Orrin Hatch is probably the busiest Republican in the Congress. Besides being a senior member of the Judiciary Committee questioning Sonia Sotomayor, he's also a key player in the health-care reform legislation moving through the Senate.
Hatch is both a member of the Senate Finance Committee and the Health, Education, Labor, & Pensions (HELP) Committee. Both panels are tasked with writing the health-care bill. Additionally, he's also on the so-called "gang of seven" which is a group drilling down on a bipartisan solution for health-care reform.
(Hatch also serves on the Intelligence Committee, which has plenty on it's plate as well.)
On the Democratic side, Chuck Schumer is the busiest. He's not only on the Judiciary panel, but yesterday, after he made his opening statement, he took the role of Sotomayor's home-state senator, introducing her to the committee.
Schumer is also a player on health care on the Finance Committee. He's tasked with bridging the divide between the centrist nature of the panel with the more liberal leanings of the Democratic caucus. And Schumer is a member of the Democratic Leadership with the rank of No. 3. (He's also Rules Committee Chairman.)
Other busybodies include:
- Chuck Grassley (R): Judiciary Committee & top Republican on Finance (dealing with health care)
- Jon Kyl (R): Judiciary and Finance Committees, plus Republican Leadership (No. 2)
- Sheldon Whitehouse (D): Judiciary and HELP Committees
- Dianne Feinstein (D): Judiciary Committee and Intelligence Committee Chairwoman
- Tom Coburn (R): Judiciary and HELP committees (and he's also an OB-GYN)