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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Rove All-But Confirms He DID Talk to Non-DOJ People About Siegelman

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In a classic non-denial denial, Karl Rove makes it clear that he did talk to people about Siegelman’s prosecution–even while he denies that he spoke to anyone in DOJ about it.

As I posted three minutes before TPM posted these "exclusively" (huh), Rove has submitted answers to questions that Lamar Smith decided to ask him about Siegelman, in lieu of actually showing up before Congress and answering questions that someone without an interest in covering up Republican politicized prosecutions might ask.

We can talk about these documents in more detail in comments (and I’ll post a timeline in a follow-up post). But here’s the most important part of the question and answers. Smith repeatedly asks Rove whether or not he ever communicated with:

Department of Justice officials, State of Alabama officials, or any other individual about the investigation, indictment, potential prosecution, prosecution, conviction, or sentencing of Governor Siegelman

And repeatedly, Rove answers that he has never directly or indirectly communicated with:

Justice Department or Alabama officials [] about the investigation, indictment, potential prosecution, prosecution, conviction, or sentencing of Governor Siegelman

Rove would not make the same denials about talking to "any other individuals" he did about DOJ and Alabama officials.

Now to be fair to old Turdblossom, Rove does add this caveat, repeatedly:

nor have I asked any other individual to communicate about these matters on my behalf

But that’s not the same thing as answering whether he spoke to anyone about it all.

So, even with Rove’s careful parsing, even having gotten questions tailor made to allow Rove to squirm out of answering real questions on this matter, he basically refuses to deny that he communicated about Siegelman’s prosecution with other people. Rove doesn’t even deny he spoke to Bill Canary or Rob Riley (Rob is the son of the governor, and therefore not an Alabama official) about it, which is one of the central implications of all the allegations out there!

It was a nice trick, Lamar Smith, to try to pretend that Rove had answered real, antagonistic questions about his involvement in the Siegelman affair. But I think all you’ve accomplished is to make it clear that he was, in fact, involved in the plot to prosecute Governor Siegelman.

[As a reminder, Governor Siegelman will chat with us tomorrow at 12ET/9PT, so we’ll get the opportunity to ask him what he thinks of this wild parsing.]

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Pardon Watch: The Betting Pool

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I can’t tell you how many times I started this post–an open thread for predictions of who, how many, how explicit the crimes that Bush would pardon. But every time I started the post, I deleted it–thinking it was unseemly to start Pardon Watch this early (though, admittedly, a full year after Libby’s commutation kicked off the self-protective pardon-fest).

But now Charlie Savage has broached the subject. And Dan Froomkin piled on, too, noting the vile Victoria Toensing calling for pre-emptive pardons of any and all long-term investigations:

‘The president should pre-empt any long-term investigations,’ said Victoria Toensing, who was a Justice Department counterterrorism official in the Reagan administration. ‘If we don’t protect these people who are proceeding in good faith, no one will ever take chances.’

(I guess Victoria doesn’t have much faith in McCain’s ability to win this election….)

So I hereby kick off a once-monthly post calling for predictions on how many Get Out of Jail So You Can Keep Me Out of Jail Free cards Bush issues. Plus one for Roger Clemons, because Bush is a baseball guy…

We’ll give out five hub-caps, one for the most accurate guess each month. bmaz–I’m adding five hubcaps onto your normal football requisition.

Here are my current predictions and Bush’s likely logic behind each: Read more →

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Meet the Bloggers and SendKarlRoveToJail.com

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meet the bloggers
Well that was fun. A replay of the premiere of Meet the Bloggers should be up here shortly. [Update: It’s both there now and at left.] The highlight of the piece, IMO, is that Cenk got the name of the Sargeant at Arms in: Bill Livingood. How cool would it be if a guy named "Livingood" walked up to Karl Rove and put him in handcuffs? It’s like something right out of Dickens. I decided yesterday that, in addition to putting Rove in a shipping container on the Mall in front of Congress (don’t worry–we’ll outfit it and air condition it) until he agrees to testify, Congress ought to contract with Blackwater to help Mr. Livingood do the arrest. After all, they’ll do anything for money, right?

Meanwhile, BNF has a petition drive up so you can encourage HJC to respond to being blown off in a timely and forceful manner.

I’ve got to go pack now so I can get a plane to Netroots Nation. I’ll poke my head in occasionally, but I expect to be pretty busy for the next several days. bmaz will have the keys, so maybe ya’ll can discuss whether or not Brett Favre should continue to start for the Packers.

[See the SendKarlRoiveToJail video here.]

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Isn’t It Time to Chat with Kyle Sampson Again?

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Here’s an exchange between Dick Durbin, Senior Senator from Illinois, and Rove acolyte Kyle Sampson about the firing of Patrick Fitzgerald.

Durbin: Were you ever party to any conversation about the removal of Patrick Fitzgerald from his position as Northern District of Illinois US Attorney?

Sampson: I remember on one occasion in 2006, in discussing the removal of US Attorneys … or, the process of considering some US Attorneys that might be asked to resign, that I was speaking to Harriet Miers and Bill Kelley and I raised Pat Fitzgerald. Immediately after I did it I regretted it. I thought, I knew it was the wrong thing to do. I knew that it was inappropriate. And I remember at the time that Harriet Miers and Bill Kelley said nothing, they just looked at me. I regretted it and I withdrew it at the time and I regret it now.

Durbin: Do you recall what you said at the time about Patrick Fitzgerald?

Sampson: I said, Patrick Fitzgerald could be added to this list.

Durbin: And, there was no response?

Sampson: No. They looked at me like I had said something totally inappropriate, and I had.

Durbin: Why did you do it? Why did you recommend, or at least suggest that he be removed as US Attorney?

Sampson: I’m not sure, I don’t remember. I think it was maybe to get a reaction from them. I don’t think that I, I know that I never seriously considered putting Patrick Fitzgerald on a list and he never did appear on a list.

Now put that exchange together with Rove’s non-denial denial that he was involved in having Patrick Fitzgerald fired:

But Robert Luskin, Rove’s attorney, today issued an unequivocal statement about all of this to the Tribune on behalf of Rove, former deputy chief of staff to President Bush, architect of Bush’s presidential campaigns and a private consultant in Washington now.

"Karl has known Kjellander for many years,” Luskin said, "but does not recall him or anyone else arguing for Fitzgerald’s removal. And he (Rove) is very certain that he didn’t take any steps to do that, or have any conversations with anyone in the White House — or in the Justice Department — about doing anything like that.”

Of course, when Rove says "I don’t recall" about an event, it usually means, "I won’t admit it until you show more evidence" about that incident. Read more →

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Waxman’s Investigation

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Unlike HJC, Oversight does not publicly release subpoenas when they serve them. So Mukasey’s cowardly letter begging Bush to invoke executive privilege so he doesn’t have to go to jail for shielding Dick Cheney’s role in outing Valerie Plame is one of the first hints of the scope of what Waxman was after. Here are some details I find particularly interesting.

The subpoenaed documents concern the Department’s investigation by Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald into the disclosure of Valerie Plame Wilson’s identity as an employee of the Central Intelligence Agency. The documents include Federal Bureau of Investigation ("FBI") reports of the Special Counsel’s interviews with the Vice President and senior White House staff, as well as handwritten notes taken by FBI agents during some of these interviews. The subpoena also seeks notes taken by the Deputy National Security Advisor during conversations with the Vice President and senior White House officials and other documents provided by the White House to the Special Counsel during the count of the investigation. Many of the subpoenaed materials reflect frank and candid deliberations among senior presidential advisers, including the Vice President, the White House Chief of Staff, the National Security Advisor, and the White House Press Secretary. The deliberations concern a number of sensitive issues, including the preparation of your January 2003 State of the Union Address, possible responses to public assertions challenging the accuracy of a statement in the address, and the decision to send Ms. Plame’s husband, Ambassador Joseph Wilson, to Niger in 2002 to investigate Iraqi efforts to acquire yellowcake uranium. Some of the subpoenaed documents also contain information about communications between you and senior White House officials.

[snip]

Much of the content of the subpoenaed documents falls squarely within the presidential communications and deliberative process components of executive privilege. Several of the subpoenaed interview reports summarize conversations between you and your advisors, which are direct presidential communications. Other portions of the documents fall within the scope of the presidential communications component of the privilege because they summarize
deliberations among your most senior advisers in the course of preparing information or advice for presentation to you, including information related to the preparation of your 2003 State of the Union Address and possible responses to public assertions that the address contained an inaccurate statement. Read more →

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“Library” Rhymes with “Bribery,” Ted Stevens Edition

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The story of Stephen Payne–who just got canned from his DHS Advisory Committee position because he was selling access in exchange for donations to the Bush Library–makes it clear what a cesspool of political corruption secret and unlimited donations to Presidential libraries can be.

Which is why it is utterly unsurprising that Ted Stevens, a standout in corruption even in Alaska, has placed a hold on a bill designed to make the donations to Presidential libraries transparent.

The argument for keeping the names of donors secret is that some admirers might not want their generosity on public display. But a presidential library is no ordinary charity. It is built with private money and turned over to the National Archives to operate. If requiring disclosure might deter a generous patron with a penchant for anonymity from giving, so be it.

There ought to be a law. Actually, there would be one if it weren’t for Republican Sen. Ted Stevens of Alaska. A measure requiring disclosure of library donations — during a presidency and for four years afterward — has twice passed the House. But Stevens blocked the measure in March, arguing that it was unfair to "change the rules" on Bush — even as library officials claim they haven’t really started fundraising.

I mean, I can totally understand how, to a guy like Ted Stevens, asking the President to refrain from selling our foreign policy to the highest bidder would seem like "changing the rules."

Which is why I’m glad the Blue America-endorsed Mark Begich, the guy running to replace Stevens, is making it a campaign issue.

The American people deserve to know who is giving money to politicians at all levels of government, but especially the presidency. It’s time for Senator Stevens to stop blocking legislation that would require fundraising for presidential libraries be done out in the open. This move – on legislation that has already passed the House – is yet another instance where Stevens is choosing secrecy over transparency. He should lift his hold and let the light of day into back into Washington.

It’s hard to embarrass a guy like Ted Stevens. But I’m all in favor of piling on the charges of corruption against Mr. Toobz.

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Turdblossom’s Still a Lying Sack; AP Journalists Are Still Suck-Ups

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A number of people have pointed to Ron Fournier’s "breezy correspondence" with Karl Rove in 2004.

In a chain under the subject line "H-E-R-O," Rove replied to an e-mail from Fournier by saying, "How does our country continue to produce men and women like this?"

Fournier replied, "The Lord creates men and women like this all over the world. But only the great and free countries allow them to flourish. Keep up the fight."

Fournier, now the AP’s acting Washington bureau chief, said Monday: "I was an AP political reporter at the time of the 2004 e-mail exchange, and was interacting with a source, a top aide to the president, in the course of following an important and compelling story. I regret the breezy nature of the correspondence."

But thus far, I haven’t seen anyone point out that AP’s love affair with Turdblossom is still going strong. In yesterday’s case, the AP’s Lynn Elber allowed Rove to completely steamroll her (probably all in the name of maintaining AP’s "breezy" relationship with him). Elber was reporting on Fox News EVP John Moody’s nonchalance about employing a contemptuous character like Karl Rove.

John Moody, Fox News executive vice president, was asked if it undercuts the channel’s credibility to have someone with Rove’s "political baggage" in its lineup.

"No," Moody replied, calling the former Bush adviser an authority on politics and adding that the current difference of opinion with Congress is between Rove and lawmakers.

But then Elber portrays Rove’s refusal to testify precisely as he’d like her to–as a combination of traditional executive privilege and the much more audacious absolute immunity that Steven Bradbury dreamed up.

But when a reporter tried to press the point with Moody, Rove jumped in to dispute characterization of the dispute as personal.

"It’s not between me and Congress. I’ve not asserted any personal privilege. This is between the White House and Congress," Rove said.

The issue centers on "the ability of the president to receive advice from senior advisers and for those senior advisers not to be at the beck-and-call of Congress for testimony," Rove said.

[snip]

Rove has said previously he is bound to follow the White House’s guidance, although he has offered to answer questions specifically on the Siegelman case — but only with no transcript taken and not under oath.

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