President Fires ALL US Attorney’s

• March 14, 2007

Yes, I said all. Of course that was the previous President.

Attorney General Janet Reno fired all 93 U.S. attorneys, a very unusual practice. Republicans charged the Clintonites made the move to take U.S. Attorney Jay Stephens off the House Post Office investigation of Ways and Means Chairman Dan Rostenkowski. The network response: ABC and CBS never mentioned it. CNN’s World News and NBC Nightly News provided brief mentions, with only NBC noting the Rosty angle. Only NBC’s Garrick Utley kept the old outrage, declaring in a March 27 “Final Thoughts” comment: “Every new President likes to say `Under me, it’s not going to be politics as usual.’ At the Justice Department, it looks as if it still is.”

This week we’ve watched the media go into a slow burn over the firings of less than ten percent of what Clinton did:

The chief aide to U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales resigned amid revelations that President George W. Bush’s White House staff initiated the decision to fire federal prosecutors.
The Justice Department announced the resignation of Kyle Sampson, who was Gonzales’s chief of staff. Sampson may be called to testify by Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee who are demanding to know more about the firings of eight U.S. attorneys. Democrats have likened the dismissals to a political purge.
“U.S. attorneys have always been above politics, and this administration has blatantly manipulated the U.S. attorney system to serve its political needs,” Senator Charles Schumer of New York said at a news conference in Washington today. Schumer said Sampson’s departure “does not take the heat off the attorney general. In fact, it raises the temperature.”

US Attorney’s have always been above politics? What is that guy smoking.
In Bill Clinton’s case he didn’t have people in place ready to take over. I think the Bush administration is already filling those positions. Bill Clinton barely had an Attorney General after floundering for a while. I think I would have preferred Kimba Wood ex-bunny to Janet Reno.
I read that the dissatisfaction with these US Attorneys has gone back a ways. Harriet Meyers was frustrated with all of their performances and wanted them fired.

The start of the process that eventually saw seven US Attorneys fired last December (and another earlier) began with Harriet Miers, the White House counsel who had briefly been a Supreme Court nominee, according to the Washington Post. Unhappy with a lack of progress in fighting voter fraud, Miers requested through aides that Alberto Gonzales fire all 93 prosecutors at once after the 2004 elections, a move the Attorney General considered too disruptive:

I have to agree that the lack of investigation in voter fraud is a disgrace. An illegal vote is every bit as important as a person who was disallowed his right to vote. In effect if a leftie votes illegally he’s canceling out my vote and in effect taking away my vote.

Tags: Politics

http://Array 2Hotel9

BullF**kingShit. US Attorneys are always getting the boot for political reasons. Always have and always will. They serve at the discretion and pleasure of the seated President. They can be changed like used condoms, mainly because they are lawyers, and of far less use to the Human Race than condoms.
Steve L.

isn’t it funny how the whole story comes out after they’ve had time to make it up. this might’ve been useful a week or two ago. too bad Rove’s neurons aint firing faster.

Actually, Rove discussed this very issue last week when he lectrued at the Clinton School of Government. I just watched a clip of it on our local news.

Needless to say, the MSM still hasn’t figured this out.
http://SayAnythingBlog.com The_Whistler_ofnd

Sparkie, thanks for letting me know about that. I ain’t going to let it go to my head.

Yep, top of the fold in Google, little ole me.

Things are going to start happening to me now.
http://politicalcritic.com/ PoliticalCritic

Only three U.S. Attorneys have been forced out since 1981 and all were for ethical issues. Until Bush came along, nobody fired these people for political purposes.
liberalityequalsfreedom

… And Bush fired all of Clinton’s appointees. This is common practice. These are Bush’s OWN appointees who all acted “too independently”, i.e. not favourable towards the Bush administration itself, as if they were supposed to sacrifice their integrity for partisan pressure. NOW, with the “Patriot Act” there is no legislative oversight to any new appointees. Do you care that your elected representatives have no say in this matter?
Neiman

Woof: I will only concede that single point, if they were ordered to break the law; “divulge ongoing investigations or file false or dishonest charges against someone. But, you KNOW my point was not about something criminal in nature being involved, but whether or not he could fire them for almost any other petty reason.

I think he could fire them because he didn’t like their religious beliefs or because they were gay or because they shaved their legs or other stuff like that; although if that came to light, he would certainly suffer the consequences in public opinion/support.
MikeAdamson

I haven’t followed this very closely but I am struck by the notion that firing all of a previous Administration’s prosecutors is somehow more partisan than firing a select few. Most incoming regimes request the resignations of senior mandarins as a matter of course and many, if not most, resignations are accepted. This case seems different though because the firings were not part of a general sweeping out of the old and occurs part way through the president’s mandate.

Leaving aside the particulars of each individual prosecutor’s case, isn’t this event unusual in American tradition?
Steve L.

Only three U.S. Attorneys have been forced out since 1981 and all were for ethical issues. Until Bush came along, nobody fired these people for political purposes.

This is probably a semantics game. I learned in a class many years ago that it was tradition for the incoming President to ask for the resignation of all the US Attorneys and the Attorneys to resign. I suppose that, technically, they weren’t “forced out.” They resigned. That’s what happened in the case of the Clinton White House. Reno demanded that they resign.

Not exactly the same as them leaving of their own volition.
John

Are U.S. attorneys removed when a new president takes office?

Yes. Upon taking office, most presidents choose a new slate of U.S. attorneys. However, U.S. attorneys may stay on for a time if they are in the midst of a major investigation or prosecution.

Are U.S. attorneys always removed after four years in office?

No, not if the president who appointed them is reelected. When Presidents Reagan and Clinton were reelected, their U.S. attorneys stayed in office for a second four-year term.

That tradition was well-known to the Bush administration. In a memo sent to the White House last year, D. Kyle Sampson, Atty. Gen. Alberto R. Gonzales’ aide who quit this week, said the customary practice was to have U.S. attorneys “serve for four years and then holdover indefinately (sic), at the pleasure of the president, of course.”

Are U.S. attorneys regularly removed from office at the direction of the White House?

No. Officials of past Republican and Democratic administrations say they were unaware of an instance when a large group of U.S. attorneys was dismissed at once.

Do U.S. attorneys carry out the political wishes of the White House?

Most lawyers draw a sharp distinction between policies and partisan politics. The White House or the Justice Department could tell U.S. attorneys to bring more prosecutions for drugs, pornography or immigration violations without raising eyebrows. However, they say it would be disturbing for a Republican president or his advisors to press a U.S. attorney to bring charges against a Democratic official, or vice versa.

“They take seriously their oath of office that forbids political partisanship,” said Harvard law professor Philip B. Heymann, a deputy attorney general in the Clinton administration. “It would be destructive for our system if U.S. attorneys saw themselves as owing their first loyalty to the party that appointed them.”
http://www.spankbot.net/ Trish

I remember when Reno fired all of the prosecutors during the Clinton administration. It wasn’t a big deal then either.
Neiman

Liberalityequalsfreedom:
1. Do all these U. S. Attorneys serve at the President’s prerogative or not?
2. Can’t he appoint or fire them as he chooses?
3. Does it matter why he fires them, if it is his choice?
4. Does the Constitution give the Congress authority to appoint or fire U.S. attorneys, or is it a right preserved solely for the Executive branch?
5. Is there or is there not a clear separation of powers between the Executive and Legislative branches?
6. Other than the power of the purse, what Constitutional right does the Congress have to meddle in this matter?
bob

But, as you know, the difference is that the eight that Bush fired were fired because they weren’t willing to pursue charges that weren’t backed up by evidence (with Democrats as the targets) or were pursuing charges that were backed up by evidence (with Republicans as the targets). And these were *Bush* appointees. Quite different from Clinton replacing appointees from the previous administration. Hence the resignations we’ve seen already, and more to come.
http://SayAnythingBlog.com The_Whistler_ofnd

Nah, they’re just defective.
shookdaddy

Just like the media to take pot-shots at the administration over this. It’s a red herring and everyone knows it. It’s even redder than the Valerie Plame railroad job, and twice as fishy as “voter fraud”; manufactured news with a gutless bunch of bumbling republicans unable to defend themselves at the center of it.

As to which party is more blame worthy when it comes to using law enforcement to protect their administration…”Yes dear, I’ll fire the U.S. Attorney investigating White Water but you have to promise to return those FBI files.”

“Oopsie, me forgoted to accuse the Clintons of bad things, me a bad bad reporter…” TEEHEE Sorry!

And to those who even slightly believe that US Attornies aren’t political appointments you need to ask your community college for your money back.

Not only are they political appointees, the power to appoint or dismiss lies solely with the President and not with Katie Couric.
MikeAdamson

I’ll answer my own question having reviewed the stories this morning. The President is certainly within his right to can the prosecutors but the timing is definitely unusual.
bubbawasfat

And don’t forget, when Clinton took office he fired all of GHW Bush’s cabinet members! And replaced them with Democrats! (Well, except for Secretary of Defense but, still, he fired the previous SecDef, Dick Cheney).

And then Hillary killed Vince Foster.
2Hotel9

Toot! Get away from those oilcans! He hates those oilcans!
WOOFX

Does it matter why he fires them, if it is his choice?

Very much, if they were fired for refusing to pursue bogus charges or refusing to divulge the progress of ongoing investigations.
http://sayanythingblog.com/readers/author/sparkiearbuckle sayanything-81

LEF.
Yea.

Whistler
You are above the fold on google news buddy!

If you can see, right click and view image. I think SA automatically sizes these down.
http://sayanythingblog.com/readers/author/sparkiearbuckle sayanything-81

isn’t it funny how the whole story comes out after they’ve had time to make it up. this might’ve been useful a week or two ago. too bad Rove’s neurons aint firing faster.

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