Last Friday I had a post about the Justice Department’s dismissal of a public corruption case against New Mexico governor Bill Richardson. The AP reported that sources within Justice said the investigation had been killed in Washington. More evidence of that possibility comes from a letter sent by the U.S. Attorney in New Mexico, Gregory Fouratt, who is not an Obama political appointee, but a career lawyer appointed by the federal judges in his circuit to fill the vacancy in the U.S. Attorney’s office. The purpose of the letter was …
On Friday of last week, following the announcement that Attorney General Eric Holder would appoint a prosecutor to re-investigate the CIA’s treatment of detainees, former Vice President Dick Cheney taped an interview with Fox News. During the interview, which aired yesterday on Fox News Sunday, Cheney describes Holder’s decision as an “outrageous political act” that will have “devastating” consequences within the CIA. Cheney is dead on. But unfortunately Holder’s political CIA witch hunt is just the latest example of a troubling pattern of politicization of the Justice Department under Holder. Voter …
Given the apparent political motivations behind so many of the recent decisions at the Department of Justice (DOJ) — from the dismissal of the voter-intimidation case against the New Black Panther Party to the re-investigation of CIA interrogators after DOJ prosecutors had already reviewed the matter and decided there was no reason for further criminal prosecution — the latest news about the dropping of the investigation against New Mexico governor Bill Richardson, Obama’s former nominee to be commerce secretary, raises a lot of questions. The Associated Press report cites a …
Earlier this may, Attorney General Eric Holder testified before the House Judiciary Committee. He was questioned by former California Attorney General and Congressman Dan Lungren (R-CA) and former Texas trial judge, and Congressman Louis Gohmert (R-TX) about waterboarding and torture. Lungren and Gohmert both trapped Holder into admitting that successfully prosecuting our CIA personnel would be next to impossible. Watch: [youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YjnHErJVrg[/youtube]
According to a report this afternoon from The Washington Post, Attorney General Eric Holder has decided to appoint a prosecutor to re-examine whether there is enough evidence to launch a full-scale criminal investigation of current and former CIA personnel who may have broken the law in their dealings with detainees. According to the New York Times, these cases were all already investigated and referred to the Justice Department by the C.I.A.’s Inspector General. There is no indication from the Washington Post or the New York Times that Attorney General Holder …
Heritage Senior Legal Fellow Hans von Spakovsky has been closely following the politicization of the Obama Justice department under Attorney General Eric Holder, most recently covering the decision by Obama political appointee Associate Attorney General Thomas J. Perrelli to dismiss a voter intimidation lawsuit against the New Black Panther Party. The left has been largely silent about the rank hypocrisy of this decision, but that is slowly changing. Professor of Political Science and Law at Vanderbilt University Carol Swain writes at The Huffington Post: In case you missed the story, …
The Washington Times has published more follow-up stories today and yesterday about the Justice Department’s dismissal of a voter intimidation lawsuit against the New Black Panther Party (a racist hate group according to the Southern Poverty Law Center) – despite the fact that the defendants defaulted and failed to answer the complaint. The new revelation is that Associate Attorney General Thomas J. Perrelli approved the dismissal. He is the No. 3 official at Justice and is a political appointee who raised $500,000 for President Obama’s campaign. There is no doubt …
Attorney General Eric Holder gave a speech to the National Association of Attorney’s General this week. In that speech, he renewed the Justice Department’s support for the Adam Walsh Act. The Adam Walsh Act—passed by a wide margin in Congress—requires some convicted sex offenders to register with local authorities. So far, so good, right? One problem: to date, Eric Holder’s Department of Justice 2010 budget gives $0 to implementation of the Adam Walsh Act, and $0 to the SMART Office which implements the Act. There is more to this than …
Remember when those on the left kept saying it would be the end of American democracy as we know it if the military had the authority to indefinitely detain suspected terrorists? Well now that President Barack Obama is in power his two top legal appointees have both affirmed President George Bush’s position on the matter. The Los Angeles Times reports: Harvard Law Dean Elena Kagan, President Obama’s choice to represent his administration before the Supreme Court, told a key Republican senator Tuesday that she believed the government could hold suspected …
Eric Holder, the new Attorney General has the opportunity this week to show whether he really intends to keep his promise of supposedly making sure there are no “politics” in the actions and decisions made by the Department of Justice. As Steve Hayward reports over at National Review, the Washington Post had a “frothy” story about Michael Steele on Saturday with completely unproven allegations of campaign finance violations by Steele’s failed Senate campaign, allegations made by a convicted swindler who prosecutors say stole almost $40 million. The Washington Post received …
