A Purge

14 March 2007



White House Counsel Considered Firing All US Attorneys

On December 7 of last year, 7 US attorneys were fired and another had been dismissed a few months earlier. The administration claimed it was a routine personnel matter, getting rid of poor performers. Documents the White House turned over to Congress yesterday suggest otherwise. Indeed, Harriet E. Miers (White House counsel and failed Supreme Court nominee) suggested sacking all 93 US attorneys, which would mean the Bush administration would be able to appoint its own people to the positions. The idea was shot down, not because it was wrong, but because 93 seemed like too many.

The smoking gun here is a memo from D. Kyle Sampson, who resigned yesterday as chief of staff for Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, to Ms. Miers in January 2006, reported in yesterday’s Washington Post. “I recommend that the Department of Justice and the Office of the Counsel to the President work together to seek the replacement of a limited number of US Attorneys. [A] limited number of US attorneys could be targeted for removal and replacement, mitigating the shock to the system that would result from an across the board firing.”

In the private sector, good workers lose their jobs all the time because of bad managers and market conditions. They don’t get replaced; their jobs are just gone. That is not the case in the Justice Department. Getting rid of a US Attorney means a new one must be appointed, and the White House would get to do the appointing. Thanks to a clause in the Patriot Act, the Attorney General can appoint interim US Attorneys who don’t need Senate confirmation.

Mr. Sampson also wrote in a September 17 e-mail to Ms. Miers, that because they didn’t need Senate approval, “we can give far less deference to home state senators and thereby get 1.) our preferred person appointed and 2.) do it far faster and more efficiently at less political costs to the White House.” Interestingly, the administration didn’t even trust the GOP-controlled Senate to cooperate, when it had rolled over for the president on so much else.

Since the Democrats now control Congress, there may well be hearings over this. Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) has said, “There’s an emerging pattern that is extremely disturbing and everyday the sanctity of US Attorneys as neutral enforcers of law without fear or favor is diminished. We will get to bottom of this.” Given that the most dangerous piece of real estate in Washington is that between Senator Schumer and a TV camera, these hearings could well wound the Justice Department and the Attorney General gravely. The 2008 Congressional elections have begun.

© Copyright 2007 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Fedora Linux.

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