The Washington Post reports that President Obama’s nominee to be the new Director of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, will not get a Senate confirmation vote until the next session of Congress convenes in January. The Senate has already begun the confirmation hearings for Michelle K. Lee, the nominee and current deputy director, and Lee is not expected to face many substantive objections to her confirmation. However, Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT), Chairman of the Judiciary Committee, and Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA), who is slated to take the gavel when the Republicans take over the Senate in January, appear to agree that, in Grassley’s words, “there isn't enough time for these nominations to be confirmed before we adjourn.” What with the current Congress being so productive and all. Read the full article here.

By Tim Evanson from Washington, D.C., USA, United States of America (USPTO-Alexandria-2011-03-12_a) [CC-BY-SA-2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0)], via Wikimedia Commons.

Reposted from The Washington Post.