Why the House Is Waiting to Hold Rove in Contempt

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I wanted to elaborate on what I said in yesterday’s post–to talk about where I think Rove’s contempt vote is going.

As I said yesterday, HJC expects that John Bates to rule on their suit pertaining to Harriet Miers and Josh Bolten sometime in August. It could be the beginning of August, it could be the end of August, but sometime in August. I know some on HJC are cautiously optimistic that Bates will give them a reasonable ruling. But, for all the reasons Kagro X lays out, I’m not.

The House Judiciary Committee subsequently filed suit in federal court, seeking an order compelling the US Attorney to proceed with the prosecution, and somehow — magically! — the case was assigned to former Whitewater Deputy Independent Counsel John D. Bates, the federal judge who dismissed the Plame lawsuit, dismissed the Cheney Energy Task Force lawsuit, upheld the validity of Bush’s signature on an a bill not properly passed in the same form by both houses of Congress, and dismissed the DNC’s lawsuit seeking to force the FEC to rule on John McCain’s attempt to withdraw from his presidential campaign’s public financing commitments.

I don’t know about you, but I’m not really feeling the fear with respect to the statutory contempt thing.

Bates specializes in rulings that say (as his Plame ruling did), "I can see why you’re concerned about the issue in chief, but I’m not going to rule in favor of you because of this technicality."

Now, no matter how Bates rules, that case will continue in the courts. Either the White House will appeal an adverse ruling, or Congress will, or the technicality Bates relies on will just postpone a court judgment. Nancy Pelosi said in a conference call earlier this year that she would continue to pursue this ruling in the courts even after Bush is chased out of office, because the principle is that important. So that ruling will continue.

Meanwhile, one of the most likely technicalities for Bates to fall back on in the Miers and Bolten ruling is centrally important to Rove’s future. At the hearing on the suit in June, Bates asked the House Counsel specifically why he wasn’t pursuing inherent contempt.

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Rove’s Contempt: For All the Reasons We’ve Been Talking About

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As many of you noted while we were having our little server issues this morning, HJC just recommended Rove be held in contempt by a vote of 20-14. The big challenge at this point will be convincing Speaker Pelosi–whose phone number is (202) 225-0100–to take up this recommendation immediately, and do so with the goal of holding Rove in inherent contempt. The ruling from Judge Bates–on Miers’ and Bolten’s contempt–should be forthcoming, which may or may not accelerate this process.

While we’re waiting for Bates’ ruling, I thought I’d look at Conyers’ report on the contempt vote for Rove–not least because it hits on many of the points I’ve hit on here–but which journalists seem to be missing. Among other points Conyers makes are:

Rove Didn’t Deny the Central Allegations against Him in the Siegelman Case

As I pointed out in this post, Rove doesn’t even answer the jerry-rigged questions Lamar Smith gave him to try to get him out of testifying. In particular, Rove refused to answer questions about whether he had spoken with "any individual" aside from DOJ or Alabama officials regarding the Siegelman prosecution. As Governor Siegelman pointed out when he did our live chat last week, that doesn’t even exclude conversations with Rob Riley or Bill Canary!

First, Mr. Rove’s written answers to the questions posed by ranking Member Smith do not appear to resolve the questions about his possible role in the matter. For example, Mr. Rove was asked if he ever communicated with “any Department of Justice officials, State of Alabama officials, or any individual” about the investigation or prosecution of Governor Siegelman. He answered only that he had not communicated with “Justice Department or Alabama officials” about the matter. The failure to address whether he communicated with any other “individual” suggests that Mr. Rove may have communicated with political operatives such as Bill Canary, the Governor’s son Rob Riley, non-Department of Justice Executive Branch officials such as his White House colleagues, or even members of the federal Judicial branch.

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The Smearmongers Who Took Down Chiara and Hagen Got Promoted to Main Justice

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TPMM and LAT elaborate on what I reported yesterday–that the anti-gay discrimination described in yesterday’s Monica Goodling report was targeted at Margaret Chiara and Leslie Hagen. Both have interviews with Hagen’s attorney; the LAT did an interview with Chiara herself. And together, the LAT interviews describe the gossip-mongering of a few people within the USA office in Grand Rapids providing both the rumors that the women were in a gay relationship–and that Chiara’s management had created morale problems in Grand Rapids.

The report describes an alleged "sexual relationship" between a career prosecutor and a U.S. attorney, who were not named. Margaret M. Chiara, the former U.S. attorney in Grand Rapids, Mich., said in an interview with The Times that she now believed she was fired because of the erroneous belief that she was having a relationship with career prosecutor Leslie Hagen.

"I could not begin to understand how I found myself sharing the misfortune of my former colleagues," Chiara said of the eight other U.S. attorneys who were fired. "Now I understand."

Justice officials said after her firing that Chiara was let go because of mismanagement and because she had caused morale in her office to sink. Chiara said Monday she believed those concerns were raised by the same people who spread rumors about her and Hagen. [my emphasis]

Most troubling, though, is the suggestion from Lisa Banks, Hagen’s attorney, that the attorneys who started those rumors eventually won jobs at Main Justice.

Banks said she believed the rumors were started by other attorneys in the Grand Rapids office who eventually landed jobs at the Justice Department in Washington. [my emphasis]

How convenient. Someone plays to Monica Goodling’s narrow-mindedness and gives her a reason to fire Chiara–and they get moved up to DC. I wonder if they share an office with Rachel Paulose?

Monica Discriminated against Margaret Chiara’s Purported Lover, Too

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Over a year and a half has passed since Margaret Chiara was fired with a bunch of other US Attorneys–and we still have no good explanation why she was targeted. The apparent reason, though, is a rumor that she was having a gay relationship with an AUSA in her office, traveled with her on the government dime, and gave her preferential bonuses.

But today’s Monica Goodling report includes a denial from Chiara and the AUSA–Leslie Hagen–that they were in a relationship.

The AUSA told us that the rumors were false and that she was not involved in a sexual relationship with her U.S. Attorney. Similarly, the U.S. Attorney denied that she and the AUSA were involved in a sexual relationship.

We know these two are Chiara and Hagen because the details line up perfectly with Chiara’s description of learning that Hagen’s EOUSA detail on the Native American Issues Subcommittee would not be extended.

Here’s a description of the incident from today’s report.

In October 2005, an AUSA was detailed to EOUSA to work on Native American issues. She had been an AUSA since 2002, and had previously been a Republican elected office holder in her home state. As discussed below, we found evidence that, in part on the basis of this AUSA’s alleged sexual orientation, Goodling prevented an extension of the AUSA’s detail in EOUSA, attempted to prevent her from obtaining a detail to the Office of Sex Offender Sentencing, Monitoring, Apprehending, Registering, and Tracking (SMART) in the Office of Justice Programs (OJP), and attempted to prevent her from obtaining a position with the Office on Violence Against Women (OVW).

A. EOUSA Detail
In the summer of 2006, the AUSA’s supervisor at EOUSA, Dan Villegas, offered her an extension of her EOUSA detail, which she accepted. Later, in October 2006, Villegas and the U.S. Attorney for whom she had worked told the AUSA that her EOUSA detail would not be extended. Villegas told the AUSA that EOUSA Deputy Director Nowacki had been instructed by Goodling not to extend the detail. The AUSA said that Villegas also told her this was a political decision and was not based on her performance. In fact, the AUSA’s 2006 performance appraisal, which covered her detail at EOUSA, rated her performance as “Outstanding” on all performance elements, the highest possible appraisal.

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Bush’s Idea of Worthwhile Candidates to Be Immigration Judges

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The "Monica Goodling Report" makes it clear that the Bush Administration changed the hiring process for immigration judges not only to ensure judges would be tough on immigration, but to create a slew of patronage jobs they could offer to loyal Republicans. At one point, Monica’s predecessor at DOJ as White House Liaison, Jan Williams, pledged immigration judge slots as if part of some kind of lottery–"let the games begin!"

On May 17, 2005, Williams received an e-mail from the White House Office of Political Affairs addressed to White House Liaisons in agencies throughout the executive branch. The e-mail urged the White House Liaisons to “get creative” and find positions for more than 100 “priority candidates” who “have loyally served the President.” The White House also sought from each White House Liaison a “pledge of the number of the 108 priority candidates you can place at your agency.” In a follow-up e-mail, the White House reiterated that “we simply want to place as many of our Bush loyalists as possible.” The context of the emails made plain that the positions sought were political, non-career slots. On May 19, 2005, Williams responded: “We pledge 7 slots within 40 days and 40 nights. Let the games begin!”

As you can imagine, lotteries of hack Republicans don’t necessarily result in qualified candidates. But some of the ones described in the report rival Michael Brown in their lack of qualifications for the position.

On candidate described in the report has been described in earlier reporting–a New Hampshire GOP operative and former Judd Gregg campaign treasurer, Francis Cramer, who failed to get a job as a tax judge.

The first example of a direct appointment in which Sampson referred an IJ candidate to EOIR involved an attorney who served as the campaign treasurer for a Republican Senator from New Hampshire. The campaign treasurer had been nominated to the U.S. Tax Court by President Bush in 2001, and Sampson was the person at the White House who was assigned to “shepherd” the candidate through the nomination process. The nomination was not successful, and the candidate was appointed to a political position in the DOJ Tax Division.

In October 2003 the candidate approached an official in the OAG to inquire about IJ positions, and learned that Sampson was in charge of IJ hiring.

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Monica’s Job History

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The DOJ IG report provides more details than we’ve seen before of Monica Goodling’s entire work history. And when you look at it, it’s pretty damn clear that her primary purpose at DOJ was to politicize the department.

Here are the details the report gives. As we knew, Monica’s first job out of law school was doing oppo research for the RNC:

From 1999 to February 2002, she worked for the Republican National Committee (RNC) where she held the positions of research analyst, senior analyst, and deputy director for research and strategic planning. Among her duties was what she described on her résumé as “a broad range of political research.”

Her first job at DOJ was spin–working in the Public Affairs department with Libby’s future PR flack Barbara Comstock and Rove’s future PR flack Mark Corallo:

According to Goodling’s résumé, while at OPA she worked closely with the OAG regarding public communications about the Department’s work, including media events, press releases, speeches, and talking points.

Then, they shipped her across the Potomoc for a short sting in a US Attorney’s office–so she’d look like a "real" lawyer when future promotions became available.

In September 2004, Goodling began a 6-month detail as a Special Assistant United States Attorney in the USAO for the Eastern District of Virginia, where she handled criminal felony and misdemeanor cases.

I believe the use of  "handled" here does not include actually "handling" anything in a courtroom–as I recall Monica testified before Congress she had no real prosecutorial experience.

But here’s the real tip-off about Monia’s career: they created a brand new political Deputy Director of EOUSA for her to move into in March 2005–at which position they had her approving waivers for AUSA hires requested by interim US Attorneys. 

The political Schedule C Deputy Director position for Goodling was a new position within EOUSA. Contemporaneous e-mails of senior managers within the OAG and ODAG indicate that OAG personnel approved Goodling’s appointment as a political Deputy Director.

Then finally, they institutionalized and expanded this institutionalized political hiring and firing function by moving it to the Attorney General’s office.

Goodling’s major responsibility as White House Liaison was to interview and process applicants for political positions in the Department. In that job, she also interviewed and was involved in the selection of career attorneys who were candidates for temporary details to various Department offices, and candidates for immigration judge and Board of Immigration Appeals positions. In Read more →

Monica Goodling Helped the Terrorists Win

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Apparently, in Monica Goodling’s world, Democrats are scarier than terrorists. That’s the only thing I can conclude from the news that Goodling even politicized the hiring of am EOUSA counter-terrorism position, resulting in the US being served by an unqualified hack rather than someone who knew something about terrorism.

For example, an experienced career terrorism prosecutor was rejected by Goodling for a detail to EOUSA to work on counterterrorism issues because of his wife’s political affiliations. Instead, EOUSA had to select a much more junior attorney who lacked any experience in counterterrorism issues and who EOUSA officials believed was not qualified for the position.

In a post 9/11 world, how did this go unmentioned? And what does President Bush plan to do about the fact that this woman helped the terrorists win?

The Monica Goodling Report

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The Department of Justice’s Inspector General’s Office has released another of its reports on the politicization of DOJ under Bush. This one ought to be called the Monica Goodling report, as it focuses on her litmus test hiring. I’ll post some updates on the details, but here is the conclusion:

In sum, the evidence showed that Sampson, Williams, and Goodling violated federal law and Department policy, and Sampson and Goodling committed misconduct, by considering political and ideological affiliations in soliciting and selecting IJs, which are career positions protected by the civil service laws.

Not only did this process violate the law and Department policy, it also caused significant delays in appointing IJs. These delays increased the burden on the immigration courts, which already were experiencing an increased workload and a high vacancy rate. EOIR Deputy Director Ohlson repeatedly requested candidate names to address the growing number of vacancies, with little success. As a result of the delay in providing candidates, the Department was unable to timely fill the large numbers of vacant IJ positions.

We also concluded that Goodling committed misconduct when she provided inaccurate information to a Civil Division attorney who was defending a lawsuit brought by an unsuccessful IJ candidate. Goodling told the attorney that she did not take political factors into consideration in connection with IJ hiring, which was not accurate.

In addition, we concluded that Williams provided inaccurate information to us concerning her Internet research activities.

Because Goodling, Sampson, and Williams have resigned from the Department, they are no longer subject to discipline by the Department for their actions described in this report. Nevertheless, we recommend that the Department consider the findings in this report should they apply in the future for another position with the Department.

In addition, we concluded that EOUSA Deputy Director John Nowacki committed misconduct by drafting a proposed Department response to a media inquiry which he knew was inaccurate. Although Nowacki knew that Goodling had used political and ideological affiliations to assess career attorney candidates for EOUSA detail positions, he drafted a media statement in which the Department would have denied the allegations. Nowacki is still employed by the Department. Therefore, we recommend that the Department consider appropriate discipline for him based upon the evidence in this report.

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They’ve Compartmentalized Mukasey from the Corruption

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I know, I know, a lot of you want me to talk about Rove in Ohio. But I’ve been distracted with something else so I haven’t had a chance to assess it yet, and anyway, I’ve been pondering this assessment from Scott Horton:

The ultimate problem here is that Mukasey is not paying attention to the matter. Instead he is relying on political flaks at the Justice Department to prepare answers on his behalf, trodding down the same path that destroyed the careers of Alberto Gonzales and Paul McNulty. He has allowed himself to be roped into a series of incorrect statements about specific aspects of the Siegelman investigation. Michael Mukasey needs to recognize that he has brought his tenure at the Justice Department to the edge of a precipice.

Horton is talking, specifically, about the Siegelman investigation in general, but I suspect Horton is right on the money, and not just as it pertains to Siegelman (heck! maybe it pertains to the Ohio allegation as well…).

To support that argument, I point to two exchanges in Mukasey’s testimony before the House Judiciary the other day which suggest he’s not being informed of key issues that Congress regards as critical. First, there was his admission that he only recently realized–presumably between his testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee, when he refused to guarantee that Congress would learn the results, and that before HJC, when he said Congress would "absolutely" learn the results–that Congress itself requested the OPR investigation of the Siegelman affair.

Davis: Can we see OPR report?

MM: Absolutely. Congress was the complainant. Complainant always informed. If finding of misconduct, then you’ll get the report.

It is inconceivable to me that Mukasey didn’t go into the SJC hearing expecting a question about the Siegelman affair, if for no other reason than all the chatter pertaining to his Siegelman-related subpoena from HJC at the time. But no one thought to inform the Attorney General two key facts: that Congress had requeted the investigation and that, therefore, Congress would be guaranteed to learn of its results. Now, to some degree, this was just bad staff work on the part of DOJ, a failure to prepare for an obvious question. But the effect was to put Mukasey into an antagonistic relationship with Congress, defending something (hiding the results of the OPR investigation) that put the AG into an unnecessarily confrontational position.

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Sanchez v. Mukasey on “Executive Privilege”

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I wanted to look closely at the exchange between Congresswoman Sanchez and Attorney General Mukasey to see if it gets us any closer to determining whether DOJ reviewed Bush’s invocation of absolute immunity for Rove–and specifically whether Mukasey bought off on the claim that the matters in question pertained to Rove’s "official duties."

Sanchez: There are a number of different areas of questioning that I have and I’m going to try to get through them as quickly as I can. First off, in response to questioning before the Senate Judiciary Committee on July 9 about the allegations of selection prosecution of Alabama Governor Don Siegelman, you stated and I’m quoting you here, "Various avenues open for exploring those allegations, including having testimony on the subject." Given your assertion about the ability of Congress to investigate the Siegelman matter through testimony, I’m wondering, do you support Karl Rove’s decision to ignore a congressional subpoena on July 10 and refuse to testify about his role in the Siegelman matter and other matters regarding the politicization of the Justice Department?

Mukasey: As I understand it, Mr. Rove acted at the request of the President in response to the invocation of Executive Privilege. He has offered to meet with staff, he has offered to discuss the matter–

Sanchez: But he has not offered to be under oath or be subjected to a transcript, and my understanding from prior court law–and I would expect an Attorney General to understand this as well–is that if the White House wishes to invoke a claim of Executive Privilege, the witness still has to present himself before Congress and claim that privilege on a question by question basis.

Mukasey: With all due respect, that’s a matter that is still being litigated on which I can’t comment any further.

Sanchez: But prior case law has held that that is the case.

Mukasey: Don’t know that. I know that is a matter under active litigation and is I believe sub judice before a judge in–

Sanchez: So you agree that Karl Rove can disregard a congressional subpoena–

Mukasey: What I’m saying is the question of whether an immediate advisor to the President has to appear at all when a proper claim of has been made of Executive Privilege is a matter that I believe is actively before a District judge and I shouldn’t comment anymore on that and I won’t.

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