In the aftermath of Ninth Circuit nominee Goodwin Liu’s massive fourth supplement to his Senate questionnaire response, all the Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee have signed an excellent, and very strongly worded, letter today to chairman Patrick Leahy condemning Liu’s “glaring omissions”:

At best, this nominee’s extraordinary disregard for the Committee’s constitutional role demonstrates incompetence; at worst, it creates the impression that he knowingly attempted to hide his most controversial work from the Committee. Professor Liu’s unwillingness to take seriously his obligation to complete these basic forms is potentially disqualifying and has placed his nomination in jeopardy.…
Professor Liu’s hearing is currently scheduled for Friday, April 16, 2010, a mere 51 days after he was nominated, and now a mere 11 days after the Committee has received what essentially amounts to a new Questionnaire. This expedited schedule is unacceptable given that we have no confidence in the completeness and accuracy of his record before the Committee. Accordingly, we request that you postpone the Committee’s consideration of this nomination. We believe that maintaining the integrity of the Committee’s constitutional advise and consent responsibilities more than justifies such a request.

I’ll separately highlight that I have today set forth yet more deficiencies in Liu’s supplemented questionnaire response.

As I wrote last week:

At this point, the only sensible course, if the Senate Judiciary Committee is to try to maintain the integrity of its proceedings, is to conduct a thorough investigation before Liu’s confirmation hearing takes place to make sure that Liu has provided all relevant information and records. Liu could expedite that investigation by authorizing committee staff to search the hard drives of his computers and to gain access to his e-mail records (subject, of course, to procedures that protect his legitimate privacy interests). Likewise, he could authorize his vetters to make fully available to the committee all his exchanges of information with them, and he and his vetters could agree to be interviewed by committee staff about the omissions in his questionnaire response.