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‘Nothing
to Hide,’ Attorney General Insists
By DAVID JOHNSTON and NEIL A. LEWIS
Published: April 16, 2007
Source
WASHINGTON, April 15 — Attorney General Alberto R.
Gonzales offered a measured apology for his mistakes
in the dismissal of eight United States attorneys,
but said in testimony prepared for a Senate hearing
on Tuesday that he had “nothing to hide” and that
none of the prosecutors were removed to influence
the outcome of a case.
In his testimony, which was released Sunday by the
Justice Department, Mr. Gonzales provided an account
of his actions that was largely consistent with his
past assertions that his role was very limited and
his recollection fragmentary.
Mr. Gonzales said that he did not select any of the
prosecutors slated for dismissal last year and that
he largely delegated the effort to his former chief
of staff, D. Kyle Sampson.
“I have nothing to hide,” he said in his testimony,
“and I am committed to assuring the Congress and the
American public that nothing improper occurred
here.”
A string of Democrats and some Republicans have
already called for Mr. Gonzales’s resignation, and
the Senate hearing is seen by many as the major
battle in his fight to keep his job. The release of
Mr. Gonzales’s testimony was part of the intense
political gamesmanship and calculation by the Bush
administration and Senate Democrats in advance of
the hearing. Mr. Gonzales also previewed some of his
testimony in an op-ed article on Sunday in The
Washington Post.
He acknowledged in his testimony that his public
statements about the firings had been confusing and
that he had misspoken at a news conference on March
13 when he asserted that he “was not involved in any
discussions about what was going on.”
And, Mr. Gonzales said, “Of course I knew about the
process because of, at a minimum, these discussions
with Mr. Sampson.”
Mr. Gonzales said he was even aware that two Justice
Department lawyers had been identified as possible
replacement candidates for attorneys to be fired,
including Rachel L. Brand, chief of the Office of
Legal Policy, and Deborah J. Rhodes, now a United
States attorney in Alabama.
After the testimony was released, two Democratic
senators, Patrick J. Leahy of Vermont, chairman of
the Judiciary Committee, and Charles E. Schumer of
New York, dismissed Mr. Gonzales’s written testimony
as inadequate.
Mr. Leahy said the Gonzales testimony was “another
in a series of contradictory statements about the
mass firing of U.S. attorneys.” Mr. Schumer said
that the testimony “does not advance his cause at
all,” and that his answers on Tuesday “will be make
or break for him.”
And the top Republican on the committee, Senator
Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, said Mr. Gonzales
would need to disclose more facts when he appeared
before the panel.
“The op-ed piece was Pablum,” Mr. Specter said
Sunday. “I’m looking for facts.”
He added, “In his testimony before the Judiciary
Committee, Mr. Gonzales is going to have to be much
more specific in answering questions about exactly
what role he played, and explain, as best he knows,
his understanding of the rationale behind the
dismissal of individual prosecutors.”
Vice President Dick Cheney continued to express the
White House’s support for Mr. Gonzales, but he made
it clear that it was up to the attorney general to
save his job.
“He’s a good man,” Mr. Cheney said in an interview
recorded Saturday and broadcast Sunday on “Face the
Nation” on CBS. “I have every confidence in him; the
president has every confidence in him.”
But Mr. Cheney added, “This took place inside the
Justice Department. The one who needs to answer to
that and lay out on the record the specifics of what
transpired is the attorney general, and he’ll do
so.”
Mr. Gonzales’s troubles come as another figure who
has played a major role in the Bush administration,
Paul D. Wolfowitz, is fighting to retain his post as
president of the World Bank after accounts that he
had used his influence to raise the salary of his
girlfriend. Both men represent important elements of
the administration’s policy, as Mr. Wolfowitz was a
principal architect of the invasion of Iraq and Mr.
Gonzales was a principal supervisor of the legal
strategy to fight terrorism.
In his statement, Mr. Gonzales admitted he had made
mistakes, but his contrition was limited largely to
missteps in the treatment of prosecutors who were
asked to resign. “I made mistakes in not ensuring
that these U.S. attorneys received more dignified
treatment,” Mr. Gonzales said. “Others within the
Department of Justice also made mistakes. As far as
I know, these were honest mistakes of perception and
judgment and not intentional acts of misconduct.”
“I am sorry for my missteps that have helped fuel
the controversy,” he said.
Mr. Gonzales is certain to be asked on Tuesday about
his own recollection of events. He has said he does
not recall a meeting on Nov. 27, 2006, in which the
dismissals were discussed. Michael A. Battle, the
former director of the department’s United States
attorney liaison office, has told Congressional
staff members that Mr. Gonzales was at the meeting
when a memorandum was circulated that provided a
detailed outline of the plan to dismiss the
prosecutors.
But Mr. Gonzales insisted in his written statement
that not one of the United States attorneys was
improperly fired. “I know that I did not and would
not ask for a resignation of any individual in order
to interfere with or influence a particular
prosecution for partisan political gain,” he said.
Mr. Gonzales’s prepared statement did not address
several significant issues cited by Democrats who
have charged that the firings were politically
motivated. Two of the prosecutors, David C. Iglesias
of New Mexico and John McKay of Washington State,
were dismissed after Republican officials complained
to the Justice Department. In Mr. Iglesias’s case,
Senator Pete V. Domenici, Republican of New Mexico,
complained to the White House about what he saw as
the prosecutor’s lack of progress on a politically
sensitive case involving Democrats.
Administration officials have said the testimony was
the product of high-level deliberations about how
Mr. Gonzales should present himself and his actions
to counter his critics and justify retaining his
post.
In the last week, Mr. Gonzales, whose courteous but
often uninformative appearances at past
Congressional hearings have left Democrats
complaining, has prepared for the hearing in
practice sessions Monday through Saturday in the
attorney general’s conference room at Justice
Department headquarters.
The meetings have included mock question-and-answer
sessions, with experienced trial prosecutors from
the department playing the role of hostile senators
asking Mr. Gonzales to be specific about his
recollection of events.
Although there is little doubt that the purpose of
Tuesday’s hearing will be about the dismissal of the
federal prosecutors, Mr. Gonzales’s comments about
that subject filled less than six pages of his
testimony, with the rest devoted to discussions of
other issues before the department.
He said he wanted to dispose of questions about the
dismissals, saying, “The sooner that all the facts
are known, the sooner we can devote our exclusive
attention to our important work,” which he said was
combating terrorism, sexual predators and illegal
drugs. |
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