Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) released a new statement Thursday afternoon regarding her continued absence from the Senate as she battles health problems, saying that her departure has not slowed down Democrats’ ability to confirm judges to federal courts.

The statement from Feinstein, 89, comes as she has faced calls in recent weeks from Democrats and Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley to resign while she continues to recover in California from a case of the shingles.

“The Senate continues to swiftly confirm highly qualified individuals to the federal judiciary, including seven more judicial nominees who were confirmed this week. There has been no slowdown,” Feinstein said. “This includes the confirmation of Judge Wesley Hsu to the Central District of California. He will make an outstanding jurist and I’m proud to see him join the federal bench.”

“While the Senate Judiciary Committee has advanced eight strong nominees during my absence, I’m disappointed that Republicans on the committee are blocking a few from moving forward,” she continued. “I’m confident that when I return to the Senate, we will be able to move the remaining qualified nominees out of committee quickly and to the Senate floor for a vote.”

New statement from Feinstein doesn’t say when she will return to Washington but asserts “there has been no slowdown” in judicial confirmations while she’s been absent.

“I’m confident that when I return to the Senate, we will be able to move the remaining qualified nominees…” pic.twitter.com/9MsufAqtIk

— Andrew Desiderio (@AndrewDesiderio) May 4, 2023

Senate Republicans blocked a plan by Democrats last month to quickly replace Feinstein on the Senate Judiciary Committee after Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) sought unanimous consent for a resolution that would allow Ben Cardin, a Democrat who is the senior senator from Maryland, to take Feinstein’s place.

“She’s a dear friend and we hope for her speedy recovery and return back to the Senate. With all due respect, my colleague, Sen. Schumer, this is about a handful of judges that you can’t get the votes for,” Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) said, per CNN.

As Graham indicated, central to the debate are nominees to federal courts around the country. By mid-February, the Senate confirmed more than 100 judicial appointments, meaning that in two years, President Joe Biden was outpacing his immediate predecessors. Any effort to reshape the federal judiciary ran into a roadblock when Feinstein became a no-show on Capitol Hill.

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Daniel Chaitin contributed to this report.

Former CIA Deputy Director Michael Morell asked fellow intelligence veterans to add their names to the letter suggesting the Hunter Biden laptop story could be part of a Russian disinformation campaign with a stated purpose of giving now-President Joe Biden‘s 2020 campaign a debate “talking point.”

The contents of his mid-October 2020 invites were first reported Thursday by the Washington Examiner, which confirmed with two separate sources with access to the correspondence, after which Just the News published an exchange between Morell and former CIA Director John Brennan about the recruiting effort.

Though the exact language appears to differ between emails sent out to dozens of former intelligence officials, the new reporting makes clear that multiple invites discussed a desire to give Joe Biden a “talking point” during his upcoming debate with then-President Donald Trump. In the email exchange published by Just the News, Brennan told Morell, “Ok, Michael, add my name to the list. Good initiative. Thanks for asking me to sign on.” Morell served as acting CIA director for several months between 2012 and 2013 during the Obama administration until Brennan was confirmed to take over the role and sworn in by Biden himself.

The letter went public on October 19, 2020, with the signatures of 51 intelligence veterans, saying the laptop’s alleged contents have “all the classic earmarks of a Russian information operation.” After POLITICO, the news outlet that first reported the statement, published a headline that said the former intelligence officials were claiming the story was “Russian disinfo,” then-candidate Joe Biden, Hunter’s father, used the statement to cast doubt on the laptop story during a debate.

After Trump brought up “the laptop from hell,” Biden fired back by saying there were “50 former national intelligence folks who said that what he’s accusing me of is a Russian plan.” Biden added: “Four, five former heads of the CIA, both parties, say what he’s saying is a bunch of garbage.”

The laptop, which Hunter Biden allegedly abandoned at a repair shop in Delaware and was later seized by the FBI, became a subject of interest in the final weeks of the 2020 campaign when the New York Post began reporting on details of the younger Biden’s shady business dealings and personal life that it contained.

For years, federal investigators have been looking into Hunter Biden over his tax affairs, foreign business dealings, and a gun purchase, per The Washington Post. The president’s son has said he expects to be cleared of wrongdoing and a charging decision is reportedly approaching. Republican lawmakers have been conducting their own investigations into Hunter Biden’s foreign business dealings as well as finances of the Biden family at large over concerns of influence peddling.

Last month, congressional Republicans released portions of a transcribed interview in which Morell said “yes” when asked if a call around mid-October 2020 from Antony Blinken, an adviser to President Biden’s campaign who is now secretary of state, triggered the letter. Morell also testified that Steve Ricchetti, chairman of the Biden campaign, called Morell following the October 22, 2022, debate to thank him for helping to put together the statement.

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When asked what his intent with the letter had been, Morell said there were two intents. “One intent was to share our concern with the American people that the Russians were playing on this issue; and, two, it was [to] help Vice President Biden,” he explained, according to the transcript.

Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee say Republicans released cherry-picked excerpts from the interview with Morell. They disclosed a different part of the transcript showing Morell said he could not remember Blinken asking or even suggesting that a statement about the laptop be put together.

“To be clear, no part of that interview demonstrates that Tony Blinken or any other Biden campaign official asked Mike Morell to write a letter about Hunter Biden’s laptop,” said a statement from a spokesperson for the Judiciary Democrats.

While Blinken denies soliciting the letter, Sens. Ron Johnson (R-WI) and Chuck Grassley (R-IA) have accused him of providing false testimony to Congress regarding his communications with Hunter Biden over the years and demanded records that refer or relate to the first son.

Among the signees on the letter, beyond Morell and Brennan, were former CIA Directors Leon Panetta, and Michael Hayden. Another of the letter’s most prominent signees, former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, in February accused POLITICO of “deliberately” misrepresenting its message. POLITICO defended its reporting about the letter.

Brennan and Clapper are expected to testify to the House “Weaponization” panel about the letter on May 11 and May 17, respectively, a source told Breitbart News.

Dan Hoffman, the CIA’s former Moscow station chief, recently came forward to say that he and “many others” were asked to sign the letter but declined to do it.

“I remember I got the letter, October 18, 2020, and at first glance, it seemed natural to lay the blame at the Kremlin’s doorstep. Remember, Vladimir Putin is in the Kremlin and he’s well known for cloak-and-dagger espionage operations,” Hoffman told Fox News. “But at the same time, there was no evidence and the letter noted there was no evidence. And I just felt like we needed to do the forensics.”