Washington – Harriet Miers, President Bush’s failed Supreme Court nominee and longtime adviser, on Thursday submitted her resignation as White House counsel. Bush, meanwhile, chose a 25-year intelligence veteran, retired Vice Adm. Mike McConnell, to be the country’s second national intelligence director.
White House press secretary Tony Snow said the president reluctantly accepted Miers’ resignation, which takes effect Jan. 31. He said a search for a successor is underway.
Bush nominated Miers in October 2005 to replace retiring Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, but she dropped out under fire from conservatives who questioned her qualifications and would not support her. Samuel Alito, a federal appeals-court judge from New Jersey, was ultimately confirmed.
Asked why she was leaving, Snow said: “Basically, she has been here six years.” He said Miers, 61, a loyal adviser to the president for years, has been having conversations with White House Chief of Staff Joshua Bolten about leaving for some time, and both agreed that it was time for a change at the White House office of legal counsel.
As White House counsel, Miers works behind the scenes overseeing a team of attorneys who provide legal advice to Bush on matters large and small.
The current national-security director, career diplomat John Negroponte, will move into the long-vacant job as top deputy to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
His nomination and McConnell’s were expected to be announced today by Bush, said a senior administration official who spoke on condition of anonymity.
The administration denied Negroponte’s move was a demotion. The senior administration official said Bush reached out to Negroponte to fill the opening for deputy secretary of state, vacant since July. Bush also talked with McConnell about becoming intelligence chief, who oversees and coordinates the 16 U.S. spy agencies.
McConnell spent more than a quarter-century as an intelligence operations and security officer. He caught the attention of then- Defense Secretary Dick Cheney and then- Joint Chiefs Chairman Colin Powell during the 1991 Persian Gulf War. McConnell regularly briefed them as an intelligence officer for the chairman of the Joint Chiefs.
