Senate Agriculture Committee Chairman Pat Roberts, R-Kan., seemed to cast doubt Sept. 14 on the prospects for President Donald Trump’s nomination of Sam Clovis to be the agriculture undersecretary for research, education and economics.

Asked by reporters after a hearing whether the committee would hold a hearing soon on the nomination, Roberts said not all of Clovis’s paperwork has been submitted.

Then he added the committee would hold a hearing “in an expeditious fashion if that is the desire of the secretary and the president.”

Clovis was a key official in the Trump presidential campaign and is a top aide to agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue.

But Senate Agriculture Committee ranking member Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich., and others have criticized Clovis for his lack of scientific credentials and some of the statements he made on his radio show and a blog related to race and other social issues.