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Gonzales Hearing Turns 'Pink'
OK, this time around, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales's appearance on Capitol Hill began with an act of dignity by the majority. Then the partisan sparks started flying, providing the appearance that House Republicans are much more aggressively defending Gonzales than their Senate GOP counterparts did three weeks ago.
The hearing into the 2006 firings of U.S. attorneys began with House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers (D-Mich.) throwing out anti-war protestors. The so-called Pink Slip ladies - who wear pink slips and T-shirts while attending hearings protesting the Iraq war - were holding signs and wearing labels with the words "resign" and other symbols Conyers viewed as undignified. The chairman personally told a few to leave before the hearing started, and then, just before Gonzales began his opening statement, Republicans objected because another "Pink Lady" was in the TV shot behind the attorney general.
Conyers agreed it was wrong and ousted her. "Don't make any statements," Conyers lectured, adding of his investigation into the firings, "We've done this too long. We've spent far too much time trying to resolve this."
This is a dramatically different approach than that of Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), who allowed the Pink Ladies to stay for the entire five hours of Gonzales's testimony April 19, allowing them to heckle and sing protest songs at the attorney general during breaks. [The hearing recessed a little while ago for votes on the House floor; several more Pink Ladies have taken up seats in the hearing room, some of whom were thrown out earlier. There was just a lot of shouting back and forth between a committee staffer and the ladies, and Capitol Police are looking very anxious. We'll monitor how this develops and report back later if they get ousted as well.]
After the protestors left the room here in the Rayburn House Office Building, however, the two sides began sparring over corruption investigations into members on both sides of the aisle. This has turned a good portion of the hearing so far into a debate over the legal definition of a "target" of a federal investigation - a very distinct term that means you're about to be indicted and you have one last chance, essentially, to plead guilty - or just to be under investigation.
So far, not much new information has surfaced in the first 75 minutes of the hearing. Three things worth noting:
• Gonzales denied that Todd P. Graves was ousted as U.S. attorney for Kansas City as part of the process that led to the firing of eight other federal prosecutors last year. As Post colleagues Amy Goldstein and Dan Eggen reported this morning, Graves was asked to leave his post in January 2006, five months before the first of the eight fired prosecutors was notified. This could be a serious contradiction in Gonzales's previous congressional testimonies, in which he specifically said only eight were fired. But the attorney general today said Graves was part of a different process, not the long evaluation process that led to the eight firings: "As part of this review process ... these [eight] were the individuals identified."
• Gonzales denied that the resignation of Debra Wong Yang, the U.S. attorney for Los Angeles, had deterred the investigation into Rep. Jerry Lewis (R-Calif.) about the more than $100 million in earmarks he directed to clients of a lobbying firm with close ties to the lawmaker. "Nothing about that investigation has been affected or impacted in any way," Gonzales said. Liberal activists have been loudly suggesting in the blogosphere and on op-ed pages that Yang might have been forced out of her post because of the Lewis investigation, and Gonzales's former chief of staff, D. Kyle Sampson, has testified in private interviews that former White House Counsel Harriet Miers took interest in seeing Yang on the list of dismissed prosecutors. The attorney general sang Yang's praises, saying that her reported $1.5 million signing bonus with a Los Angeles-based law firm was an under-payment. "She did a wonderful job. ... Whatever [the bonus] was, it was a bargain for the firm."
• Rep. James Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.) turned the tables on Democrats and focused his line of questioning on why there's been no indictment of Rep. William Jefferson (D-La.), the lawmaker who got caught with $90,000 in his freezer allegedly from a businesswoman working undercover for the FBI. Oddly, Sensenbrenner engaged in behavior that was close to the alleged behavior of Republican lawmakers who pressured U.S. attorneys to bring cases against Democrats. Sensenbrenner's pressure on Gonzales is obviously different, since he didn't directly pressure the prosecutor handling the case. "My constituents are asking me, when's something going to happen," Sensenbrenner said, only to be told he couldn't be given an answer about an ongoing investigation. "Everybody's talking about it except you," he told Gonzales angrily.
By Paul Kane |
May 10, 2007; 12:20 PM ET
Hearing Watch
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House
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Next: Gonzales Hearing Update: No More Pink
Posted by: Henly, TX | May 10, 2007 12:45 PM
I love the Code Pink women. (Not ladies). The Post did an interesting video feature on them a couple months ago.
Posted by: Rita | May 10, 2007 1:14 PM
What Sensenbrenner did was not "turning the tables" on the Democrats. It was a transparent display of exactly what Domenici tried to do to Iglesias, and of what the administration tactics are: politicizing the Dept. of Justice. The Dems are investigating this very behavior, and they should have pointed that out to Sensenbrenner at the time he was doing this.
Posted by: Jack | May 10, 2007 1:23 PM
CODEPINK4PEACE dot org
Posted by: Censored Pink | May 10, 2007 2:36 PM
Bush should have thrown out every person hired by Clinton. It would have been easier to defend.
Posted by: Cincinnatus | May 10, 2007 6:34 PM
Cincinnatus - he in effect did that, he replaced all but a handful of US attorney's in his first year of office. The issue here is his unprecedented move in firing a group of US attorneys mid-term.
Posted by: obs | May 10, 2007 10:10 PM
1.5 million signing bonus, and Yang left the Justice Dept, where she was the US Attorney investigating Rep. Jerry Lewis alleged corruption, to work for the legal firm that is...wait for it.... representing Rep. Jerry Lewis in that very same investigation.
Did you just doze off during that, Kane?
Posted by: churro king | May 10, 2007 10:16 PM
You sure that wasn't Barney Frank?
Posted by: Philip V. Riggio | May 11, 2007 5:28 PM
1.5 million signing bonus, and Yang left the Justice Dept, where she was the US Attorney investigating Rep. Jerry Lewis alleged corruption, to work for the legal firm that is...wait for it.... representing Rep. Jerry Lewis in that very same investigation.
Did you just doze off during that, Kane?
Posted by: churro king
------------------------------------------
If that does not smell of bribery, I don't know what does...
Gonzo was his weasely self at the hearings, being evasive, trying to change the subject, not recalling, saying it was sampson's fault, pleading ignorance etc... The clown did not even know how many employees the DOJ has. "Between 10,000 and 15,000" he said... That definitely does not qualify as a ballpark figure!
The House Republicans were particularly revolting: they slobbered all over the AG.
Posted by: Anonymous | May 12, 2007 6:41 AM
Seems like all the USA's were doing something that irked the White House politically. If it quacks like a duck...
Posted by: Washington, D.C. | May 15, 2007 11:35 AM
John McCain: You can pretend to be a Conservative Christian all you want, but if you are a foul-mouthed person, that's what comes out when pressured. The "real" you shows up. James Dobson is right about John McCain.
Posted by: Dorothy Marks | May 19, 2007 8:16 AM
All due respect to Congressman Conyers and to the American People's rights, but there seems to be a void between December 25 2005 and present day hearings regarding the Iraq invasion. On Decmeber 25 2005 it appeared that the Congressman was set on the hearings - attempted to present the issue to Congress - was not given the liberty of a reading - but yet today his authority to proceed with the hearings appears to be without any desire to inform the American Public about the March 2003 invasion and prior circumstances leading up to the Iraq Mistake. A lot of the whoopee that is being presented in Congress referring to the "dead-on-arrival" legislation proposed to bring the troops home - would be unwhoopeed if the investigation were to uncover a lot of the seemingly unkown. Both the Democrats and Republicans owe the American Public the courtesy of bringing the hearings on - then the Public can make up their own minds - who is right and who is wrong about the cause and effect. Putting all of the known slivers of possibilities together will create a whole picture of the issue - one that can be analyzed by the voters to determine who and why the MISTAKE has taken so long to be corrected.
Quite possible that after the voters have a opportunity to judge for themselves, the voting at November 2008 would change drastically - voting for the invasion may not be popular with the majority of the public.
Is this the prelude of things to come - hold off until after the elections before permitting the public to make a decision. This does not represent the democracy in action for fairness - perhaps the public will finally get it -- they are not supposed to know the truth.
Posted by: WILLIAM J CLEMONS | May 19, 2007 12:13 PM
Settling the immigration issue is very important - to the American Public - to the Immigrants - and to our Political Teams attempting to bring civility to the chaos that has been protruding into the sensible life style of so many throughout America. The longer the issue remains in wonderlust the longer the chaos will remain and will keep building to an extreme that becomes harder to cope with in the economic - educational - health - criminal and other societal areas. The issue is what to do with people's live that ARE ACCUSED OF BREAKING THE LAWS OF U.S. ----REALITY: U.S. NEVER ENFORCED THE LAWS FOR EVER- so whether the immigrants broke the law or U.S. was devoid in doing their job correctly - the question not mentioned.
What is certain - the solution must not contain FORCEFUL actions - there is not any record of accomplishing success by FORCE and this issue is importantly subjected to that venue if to be solved.
Fines-fees-taxes are all political ways to say different than being projected via legislation. Simply - those promulgating such costs are really saying - we don't really want to solve the problem - just pretend by showing a small desire.
Many are in favor - of sending 12 million people back to their country of orgin. That idea is completely nor workable - even if you can scare up 3400 busses and run them 24 hours per day for 365 days. The nightmare is without favorable immagination.
Amnesty - a dirty explanation of the unreal. This phrase is repeatedly political and should be erased from the objective. Call it what you want to but the real OBJECTIVE is SUCCESS.
Building the fence is a partially approved method to control border traffic. But talking is not building and the last report Mr Hunter quoted that not much of the fence had actually been constructed. Wanna bet that within 6 months thoughts will mature as to how to circumvent - go over - go under the fence and destroy the litany that the fence spells security. Look at the California fence - unscalable until attempts to scale proved successful.
The solution must remain on track to accomplsih the problem on a humanatarian project. Stop believing that FORCE will settle even part of the problem. Stop the rhretoric that leads to the EMPLOYMENT PROBLEM - the only employment problem rests on the responsibility of the EMPLOYERS not accepting an employee with proper social security card - and PAYING AT LEAST MINIMUM WAGE WITH ALL BENEFITS AWARDED TO THE EMPLOYEE. NO DISCRIMINATION. The theory that this will create an employment explosion is without validity because employment will and has always shown the ability to level according to supply and demand -if all elements are fairly applied.
The legislation presented now [380 pages which no one has read in its entirety] will probably be changed and rechanged but the end result must sever the tennacles of FORCE.
Posted by: WILLIAM J CLEMONS | May 19, 2007 12:45 PM
F__k you right back McCain. You are a traitor to your party and to your country. Why don't you campaign with Ted Kennedy because you know what birds of a feather do. Your campaign slogan should be," Viva Mexico".
Posted by: Paul McLean | May 20, 2007 10:49 AM
The comments to this entry are closed.
Well, at least Sensenbrenner made his prohibited ex parte communication in public. Which is perhaps an eloquent illustration of the problem: Republicans simply see nothing wrong with pressuring the Justice Department to investigate and indict.