(Washington) Eric Holder’s nomination as the first African-American attorney general moved to the full Senate on Wednesday with broad bipartisan support, as Republicans who earlier criticized the nominee determined he was well qualified for the job.

The only senators who voted against Holder in committee were Republicans John Cornyn of Texas and Tom Coburn of Oklahoma.

Holder previously served in the Clinton administration. In 1997 Clinton appointed Holder to Deputy Attorney General.

He has a strong LGBT rights record.

In a 1999 appearance before the House Judiciary Committee, Holder called for LGBT inclusion in federal hate crime law, noting that currently the law “provides no coverage whatsoever for violent hate crimes committed because of bias based on the victim’s sexual orientation, gender or disability, and these crimes pose a serious problem for our nation.”

The Matthew Shepard Hate Crime Act was named for the 21 year old college student who was murdered in an anti-gay hate crime in Wyoming in October 1998. It would add sexuality to the list of categories covered under federal hate crime law.

The bill passed the House in 2007 and the White House threatened to veto it. In an effort to get around a veto, the Senate version was tied to the 2008 it was stripped out.

The bill will be reintroduced in the next session of Congress and President Obama has said that if it passes he will sign it.

Before Wednesday’s committee vote, Holder’s supporters said he wouldn’t be afraid to tell President Barack Obama he was wrong. They praised him for declaring that waterboarding as an interrogation technique is torture. And they said he would be tough on crime.

“When asked whether this country at is at war he said yes,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C. “He indicated the enemy have declared war on this country long before we realized it. He sees the battlefield as the entire globe.”

Graham said he supports Holder’s view that the country needs to interrogate terrorism suspects in accordance with American values.

“I am confident this new attorney general will have a balanced approach and I look forward to working with him. I know he’s made mistakes and so have I,” Graham said.

Several senators praised Holder for his willingness to admit his mistake, when he told the White House he was leaning in favor of Bill Clinton’s pardon of fugitive financier Marc Rich – whose wife was a major Democratic contributor.