Washington – Attorney General Alberto Gonzales testified Tuesday that top congressional leaders from both parties agreed in March 2004 to continue a classified surveillance activity that Justice Department officials had deemed illegal, a contention immediately disputed by key Democratic lawmakers.
Also Tuesday, House Democrats, preparing for a vote today on contempt citations against President Bush’s chief of staff Joshua Bolten and former counsel Harriet Miers, produced a report that for the first time alleges specific ways that several administration officials may have broken the law during the multiple firings of U.S. attorneys.
Gonzales’ assertion about the surveillance program drew protests from those he said approved of it. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., who were briefed on the program at the time, said there was no consensus that it should proceed.
“He once again is making something up to protect himself,” Rockefeller said.
Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., appeared to raise the stakes for Gonzales and the administration Tuesday by suggesting that a special prosecutor may be needed to file contempt charges against the White House officials who have refused to honor congressional subpoenas.
Much of Tuesday’s to-and- fro involved a controversial episode on March 10, 2004, when Gonzales and then-White House chief of staff Andrew Card visited the hospital bed of then-Attorney General John Ashcroft, who was recovering from gallbladder surgery.
Gonzales testified that the visit followed an emergency meeting of congressional leaders, who had agreed that a classified surveillance program aimed at terrorists should continue despite objections by James Comey, the acting attorney general during Ashcroft’s illness.
“We felt it important that the attorney general knew about the views and the recommendations of the congressional leadership,” Gonzales said, adding that he and Card “never had any intent to ask anything of him if we did not feel that he was competent.”
In May, Comey testified he believed Gonzales and Card sought “to take advantage of a very sick man.”
Pelosi, Rockefeller and former senator Tom Daschle, D-S.D., sharply disputed Gonzales’ claims.
Daschle said in a statement that he is “quite certain that at no time did we encourage the AG or anyone else to take such actions. This appears to be another attempt to rewrite history.”
Later Tuesday, House Judiciary Committee chairman John Conyers Jr., D-Mich., released a report that says Congress’ investigation into the attorney firings raises “serious concerns” that senior White House and Justice Department aides may have obstructed justice and violated federal statutes that protect civil service employees, prohibit political retaliation against government officials, and cover presidential records.
The 52-page memorandum says the probe has turned up evidence that some of the U.S. attorneys were improperly selected for firing because of their handling of vote-fraud allegations, public-corruption cases, or other cases that could effect close elections.
It also says that Gonzales and senior Justice aides “appear to have made false or misleading statements to Congress, many of which sought to minimize the role of White House personnel.”
