The best bit of hubris coming out of the US Attorney firings is the notion that Bill Clinton did the same thing by firing 93 US Attorneys upon taking office. Except it isn’t analogous at all and it’s an outright lie.
Every administration of a different party than it’s predecessors replaces the US Attorneys and in Bush I, many changes were made.
From before Reagan’s Inauguration:
Copyright 1980 The New York Times Company
The New York Times
November 28, 1980, Friday, Late City Final Edition
SECTION: Section B; Page 11, Column 1; National Desk
LENGTH: 956 words
HEADLINE: DECISION BY REAGAN IS AWAITED ON U.S. ATTORNEYS WHO ARE DEMOCRATS
BYLINE: Special to the New York Times
DATELINE: WASHINGTON, Nov. 27
Many Federal prosecutors, former prosecutors and Justice Department officials say they hope that Ronald Reagan will depart from custom by allowing incumbent United States Attorneys to complete their terms.
Of all the Government officials subject to replacement by the new President, few are in so delicate or ambiguous a position as these 94 Presidentially appointed prosecutors, who try cases involving Federal laws throughout the country. They are supposed to be strictly nonpolitical in their work, though in many cases they were appointed as a result of political patronage.
They have four-year terms, but serve at the pleasure of the President. The law says that ”each United States Attorney is subject to removal by the President.” It does not say that removal may be ”only for good cause,” as some statutes provide.
Those who hope that Mr. Reagan will let the incumbents finish their terms said that such a move would enhance the lawyers’ status as professionals. He might also avoid the fights that caused embarrassment to President Carter when he removed several Republican prosecutors against their will, most notably David W. Marston, in Philadelphia.
Aides to Mr. Reagan said last week that they had not set a policy, but would be inclined to review separately the qualifications of each United States Attorney.
Merit Over Partisanship
In some large metropolitan districts, merit has begun to overtake partisan politics as a major factor in the selection and retention of United States Attorneys. Senators in about eight states, including New York, have set up merit selection commissions to screen candidates.
The terms of 52 of the 94 prosecutors expire in 1981. Another 15 terms will be up in 1982. In addition, Federal District Courts have appointed United States Attorneys to fill vacancies in 12 districts. The President could appoint new people to those positions at any time. All nominees would be subject to Senate confirmation.
The decision to retain incumbent United States Attorneys depends at least as much on senators, because Senators of the President’s party have usually had the dominant voice in choosing Federal prosecutors.
Going back in time, one can find the same thing asked in 1977 and in 1989, Jack Danforth began a panel to nominate new US Attorneys for Missouri at the request of the Bush Administration. George W. Bush retained a few, but not many.
WHITE HOUSE AND JUSTICE DEPARTMENT
BEGIN U.S. ATTORNEY TRANSITION
WASHINGTON, D.C. - Continuing the practice of new administrations, President Bush and the Department of Justice have begun the transition process for most of the 93 United States Attorneys. Attorney General Ashcroft said, "We are committed to making this an orderly transition to ensure effective, professional law enforcement that reflects the President 's priorities."In January of this year, nearly all presidential appointees from the previous administration offered their resignations. Two Justice Department exceptions were the United States Attorneys and United States Marshals.
Prior to the beginning of this transition process, nearly one-third of the United States Attorneys had already submitted their resignations. The White House and the Department of Justice have begun to schedule transition dates for most of the remaining United States Attorneys to occur prior to June of this year. President Bush will make announcements regarding his nominations to the Senate of new United States Attorneys as that information becomes available. Pending confirmation of the President's nominees, the Attorney General will make appointments of Interim United States Attorneys for a period of 120 days (28USC546). Upon the expiration of that appointment, the authority rests with the United States District Court (28USC546(d)).
The only difference in what Clinton did in 1993 was that he set out clear expectations on the first day in office. Other administrations let the question languish and created a lot of confusion. Carter in particular got a lot of flack after promising merit would only matter, but then replacing nearly all of the US Attorneys with Democrats.
Firing 8 US Attorneys during a Presidential term is unprecedented. The Congressional Research Service found 3 similar cases between 1981 and 2006. Comparing the purge of 8 US Attorneys in the middle of term to the replacement of US Attorneys at the beginning of a President’s term is so incredibly obtuse those making the argument can only be said to be lying.
A perfect example of this was Audrey Fleissig who was replaced by Ron Gruender in the Eastern District of Missouri in 2001. She only took office in September of 2000 yet was still replaced.
In addition to being a lie, this is a basic point of American democracy that is taught in Polisci 101. Those promoting the comparison should be ashamed of themselves.
I thought Clinton had Janet Reno fire 1,042,893 US Attys. Wait a minute here…..
“Comparing the purge of 8 US Attorneys in the middle of term to the replacement of US Attorneys at the beginning of a President’s term is so incredibly obtuse those making the argument can only be said to be lying.”
What you said.
The remarkable thing is how ‘on-message’ they all are. They’re fed the talking points and then they spread out to their respective media outlets.
I heard David Brooks mechanically repeat this canard first on NPR and then on the Newshour. You’d think somewhere in between he might have brushed up on the facts.
At the risk of being a lying liar, Bill Clinton replaced 93 attorneys before their terms were up. George Bush is replacing 8 before their terms are up. Clinton was replacing Republican political appointees with Democratic political appointees. George Bush is replacing Republican political appointees with Republican political appointees. Anyway you slice it, less of a big deal than what Clinton did, which was unnoteworthy.
US attorneys aren’t like Supreme Court justices where if they don’t turn out the way the President wants he’s SOL. US attorneys aren’t independent — whether or not they should be is a different question.
From your own cite:
They have four-year terms, but serve at the pleasure of the President. The law says that ‘’each United States Attorney is subject to removal by the President.’’ It does not say that removal may be ‘’only for good cause,’’ as some statutes provide.
So is the progressive position that we should follow custom over the law?
I’m sorry, but this just strikes me as dead horse beating.
===Bill Clinton replaced 93 attorneys before their terms were up.
No, this is not true. Many of them did have their term up. In Reagan’s case, 52 were coming to the end of their term–about the same with Clinton.
This is Political Science 101. I know because I have it in my teaching notes. It’s not hard to understand Kevin. Bush already replaced 93 US attorneys in 2001. He is no replacing 8 out of the blue, but all tied to political pressure and investigations or lack of investigations in the case of Washington.
Lam has broken one of the largest federal bribery scandals to ever be prosecuted and we are to believe she was doing too many political corruption cases.
===George Bush is replacing Republican political appointees with Republican political appointees. Anyway you slice it, less of a big deal than what Clinton did, which was unnoteworthy.
I’m not sure how the context is being lost here. Bush I, Bush II, Reagan, Carter, Clinton all replaced nearly all if not all of the US Attorneys at the beginning of their term regardless of whether their terms were up.
Yet since 1981 only 3 were removed for performance related issues, one being that he bit a stripper. Reagan ran one of the most disciplined appointment processes in terms of maintaining high level of political control over bureaucracies, but yet he didn’t replace that many in 8 years for cause.
No one disputes that they serve at the pleasure of the President. He can fire them at will. However, doing so is a rare occurrence and despite the Attorney General’s claim, the written record is one that these 7 all had good records and were highly praised. All seven were tied to either pursuing cases against Republicans or not pursuing cases against Democrats. Add to that the Guam case where the guy had served for over a year into the this administration after 11 previous years as an acting US Attorney and one week after notifying the Justice Department that he was investigating Abramoff he is replaced.
Basically what we have is a routine “Changing of the Guard” versus an abrupt (and unprecedented) firing of 8 US Attorneys quite possibly to stymie prosecutions that were getting a bit too close to home.
Needless to say, I don’t expect our friends on the other side to understand the difference.
So as I said, progressives (that’s you) are arguing customs, not the law. “It’s not just done” seems to be complaint #1.
President Clinton asked for the resignations before their terms were up. The term is four years – but no President appoints them the day after the take office, so typically the US attorney term runs into the next presidents term, and they are replaced as replacements are found, not en mass like President Clinton did. Again, no big deal, but certainly not how it had been handled before (I especially like your claim that Clinton’s way was a better way — although simultaneously no different — since other administrations let the attorneys languish and be confused.)
I also find it funny that the left is always going on about President Bush not admitting mistakes, and here he has fessed up to 8 mistakes — and the left still isn’t satisfied.
As to the idea that it has to do with investigations – maybe, and maybe a couple of them should have investigated voter fraud more vigorously.
I find the WSJ and Patterico have pretty good takes on the situation (as well as Andrew McCarthy).
Sorry, but I don’t trust the cherry picking that the media does and I see the main complaint as dead horse beating – every time Bush does anything the left complains. There are times when they are right, I just don’t think this is one of them.
===So as I said, progressives (that’s you) are arguing customs, not the law. “It’s not just done” seems to be complaint #1.
There are two problems. First, it’s not done and so a departure from normal practice should be announced. The Administration has agreed to this and in terms of making a mistake, I could live with that.
Second, all 7 and 8 if you include Guam, received pressure to investigate or not investigate political corruption cases with all the pressure on the side of more vigorously prosecuting cases against Democrats or more leniently prosecuting cases against Republicans. One of them, Lam, was involved in one of the great government scandals of all time involving Congress, the Executive Branch, and defense contractors.
This notion isn’t unfamiliar to those in Illinois. There was a lot of pressure to remove Fitzgerald. Once he was named for the Plame case those trying to have him removed changed their strategy to promoting him to get him out of Illinois. From all indications, other than Plame heating up, it would have happened. Who was behind this move? Daley and establishment Republicans?
===President Clinton asked for the resignations before their terms were up. The term is four years – but no President appoints them the day after the take office, so typically the US attorney term runs into the next presidents term, and they are replaced as replacements are found, not en mass like President Clinton did.
This isn’t quite correct. Clinton asked for all of their resignations, but most stayed on as acting US Attorneys until their replacement came on board. From a management perspective, it made sense, but not preparing the public for it was really stupid–as was much of the first two years of the Clinton administration.
The Wall Street Journal claims:As everyone once knew but has tried to forget, Mr. Hubbell was a former partner of Mrs. Clinton at the Rose Law Firm in Little Rock who later went to jail for mail fraud and tax evasion. He was also Bill and Hillary Clinton’s choice as Associate Attorney General in the Justice Department when Janet Reno, his nominal superior, simultaneously fired all 93 U.S. Attorneys in March 1993. Ms. Reno–or Mr. Hubbell–gave them 10 days to move out of their offices.
But here is a news story from the time:
Copyright 1993 The Atlanta Constitution
The Atlanta Journal and Constitution
March 24, 1993, Wednesday
SECTION: NATIONAL NEWS; Section A; Page 11
LENGTH: 600 words
HEADLINE: Reno to U.S. attorneys: Hand in your resignations, please
BYLINE: By Bill Rankin STAFF WRITERlaw; appointments; bill/clinton; administration; meetings; media
BODY:
Attorney General Janet Reno on Tuesday asked all of the country’s U.S. attorneys, including the three in Georgia, to submit their resignations, saying the Clinton administration wants to build its own team of federal prosecutors.
U.S. Attorneys Joe Whitley in Atlanta, Edgar Ennis in Macon and Jay D. Gardner in Savannah said Tuesday that they will comply.
All the resignations would not be effective immediately, Ms. Reno said.
The administration wants the resignations “so that the U.S. attorneys presently in position will know where they stand,” she explained, “and that we can begin to build a team that represents a Department of Justice that represents my views and the views of President Clinton.”
In her first news conference as attorney general, Ms. Reno also:
Said new legislation is needed to protect women entering abortion clinics. She noted that a recent Supreme Court ruling undermined federal authority to assure such access.
Denied reports that a successor has been chosen for embattled FBI Director William Sessions. She said no decision has been made on whether to retain Mr. Sessions, who is accused of misconduct such as using government transportation for personal use.
There are 93 U.S. attorneys, who serve at the pleasure of the president. The vast majority are Republican holdovers.
“I think the U.S. attorneys . . . are absolutely integral to the whole success of the Department of Justice,” Ms. Reno said.
Justice Department spokeswoman Caroline Aronovitz said the agency is looking for interim U.S. attorneys to serve until new ones are nominated. Some current U.S. attorneys will be asked to serve in interim roles and some will not, she said.
Mr. Whitley, 40, is serving a four-year appointment set to expire in September 1994. He said he plans to serve out his term – unless he’s replaced. “There are a considerable number of cases this office is handling,” he said, “so I intend to keep both feet in the office.”
The nomination of Mr. Gardner, 63, who was sworn in June 1, 1992, never reached the Senate for confirmation. As a result, he was appointed by the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Georgia.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The Wall Street Journal is making up history, again. McCarthy is lying if he compares the firing of 8 US Attorneys to the normal turnover at the beginning of the administration. One is an apple and one is an orange.
In terms of Lam, then why did DOJ defend her handling and demonstrate pretty well that she was doing a good job?
http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/docs/doj-lam/?resultpage=1&
Kevin — of course you are right. This is a non-story and the NYT plea to Reagan is hilarious and shows the double standard applied here. Replace “Reagan” with “Clinton” and try to imagine exactly how cold it would have to be in hell before that article is printed.
Of further hilarious note is the need to fire the 93 immediately so as to prevent “confusion,” (see, “Archpundit”) but the NYT urges the retention of the Carter attorneys to “enhance their professional status.” Other sites point to the need for retention to “smooth transition.” Apparently this only applies to Democratic appointees.
Alas, you’re in an echochamber here and not likely to penetrate the thickskulls who would have you believe they are playing this topic straight and are outraged, nevermind they looked the other way in ’93 and even pleaded with Reagan to do the very thing that Clinton ended up doing later, over no objection from the NYT.
But, it is heartening to see the Lefties finally supporting some Bush nominees after trashing most of the others, albeit unsuccessfully, including Rumsfeld, Rice, Alito, Roberts, Gonzalez etc…….
This is an “issue” only because the Iraq situation is trending however slightly in America’s favor and the Left, by way of its impotent proposals to defund the war, is being exposed for the defeatist party it is. That and the attempt to impeach Bush, which is where this is headed, most assuredly without ultimate success.
Keep up the fight, but you’re not likely to get anywhere here.
===Of further hilarious note is the need to fire the 93 immediately so as to prevent “confusion,” (see, “Archpundit”) but the NYT urges the retention of the Carter attorneys to “enhance their professional status.” Other sites point to the need for retention to “smooth transition.” Apparently this only applies to Democratic appointees.
But again, did you read the above to understand that they weren’t fired immediately, but many stayed on until the new US Attorney’s came on? You are making up facts that aren’t true.
Reagan did essentially the same thing as Clinton, but he didn’t make a formal announcement two months into the term.The time frames are essentially very similar between Reagan and Clinton over the actual replacements. This notion that they left office within 10 days is false.
What is a lie is what you have repeated that this is the same thing as what happened in 1993. It is nothing like it and even Kyle Sampson made that point in the e-mail I linked to. Bush II did the same thing as Clinton without making a big announcement and with about the same timeline in terms of replacing people as Clinton did. That is different from replacing them in the middle of the term and different given the US Attorneys’ singled out all had political complaints against them–not performance complaints until they were invented later. The DOJ defended Lam’s performance on border related crime 3 months before firing her for poor performance in the area.
Bringing up Iraq, or a woman being fat is apparently your way of not dealing with the fact that you lied about the situation in 1993 and cannot bring yourself to acknowledge it.
===Absolute, blatant lie to say Bush, Reagan, Carter and Nixon summarily fired (via mass mailing) all then-acting U.S. Attorneys on the same day within days of their becoming elected. It made news when Clinton did it back then precisely because it had never been done in that fashion.
This is from SS earlier. One might note that Clinton’s announcement was in March as was the memo from Ashcroft in 2001 announcing the transitioning. IOW, Bush II did essentially the same thing at the same time after being initially elected. Do you have some shame SS?
The Wall Street Journal is making up history, again.
McCarthy is lying if he compares the firing of 8 US Attorneys to the normal turnover at the beginning of the administration.
I call that bold talk for a one eyed fat man. Please don’t confuse honest differences with lying and dishonesty.
As far as the Wall Street Journal goes, I’m not sure what history they are making up. How many of the fired US attorneys were actually kept on in an interim role – the spokesperson only said some would be? What were the initial terms dictated to them in the request for the mass resignation? Your article is silent on those points and I at least would consider that important information. What if they were originally given 10 days to clean out, and then a few were kept on as interims ? Would the WSJ be guilty of making up history, or would you?
As far as Mr. McCarthy, did you read his piece? I thought the thrust was that US attorneys are political appointees pure and simple – which is why it was no big deal when Clinton did what he did, nor when Bush did what he did.
Lam was on the get-rid-of-list before Cunningham was still thought of a as an upstanding citizen and not the crook he was, and she was in office after she put him away. What’s the point of yanking her now if the motivation was protecting Republicans?
I’m sorry, it’s just a tempest in a teapot to me. The president replaced a few political appointees who serve at his pleasure.
It wasn’t 10 days to clean out their offices. It was 10 days to submit their resignation including reasons to stay on longer. By April 8th, 13 had been replaced.
By late May:
Copyright 1993 The Atlanta Constitution
The Atlanta Journal and Constitution
May 27, 1993, Thursday
SECTION: NATIONAL NEWS; Section A; Page 9
LENGTH: 804 words
HEADLINE: WASHINGTON IN BRIEF U.S. attorney appointments in limbo
BYLINE: By Ernie Freda STAFF WRITER
BODY:
Attorney General Janet Reno demanded written resignations two months ago from all Republican-appointed U.S. attorneys, including Joe Whitley of Atlanta, but President Clinton has yet to send the names of any replacements to the Senate. Ms. Reno requested the written resignations of 77 politically appointed U.S. attorneys – the other 16 already had left – just 11 days after she took office.
She said she wanted the resignations so “we can begin to build a team that represents a Department of Justice that represents my views and the views of President Clinton.” Reasons for the holdup: the elaborate selection processes devised by some senators; Ms. Reno’s insistence on interviewing all the candidates, who must fit a trip to Washington into their schedules; a stated goal of ethnic and gender diversity; and a crowded Justice Department agenda.
One-third of the 93 offices are still being run by Republican appointees, with career prosecutors heading most of the others, said Justice spokeswoman Caroline Aronovitz.
Compare to Ashcroft’s statement on March 14th of 2001
Prior to the beginning of this transition process, nearly one-third of the United States Attorneys had already submitted their resignations. The White House and the Department of Justice have begun to schedule transition dates for most of the remaining United States Attorneys to occur prior to June of this year. President Bush will make announcements regarding his nominations to the Senate of new United States Attorneys as that information becomes available. Pending confirmation of the President’s nominees, the Attorney General will make appointments of Interim United States Attorneys for a period of 120 days (28USC546). Upon the expiration of that appointment, the authority rests with the United States District Court (28USC546(d)).
+++++++++++++++++++++++++
It’s essentially the same timeline. McCarthey is lying about what happened. She didn’t clear out the offices within 10 days of March 23rd. She replaced only 13 of them with interim people after 16 days. The 10 day line is a lie. These stories are rife with lies. It takes me less than 10 minutes to check this out on Lexis. The difference is that Ashcroft called it transitioning–a much smarter political move, but the same damn thing.
[…] of just pointing out these easily discovered facts? Posted in Uncategorized | Trackback | del.icio.us | Top OfPage […]
1. McCarthy said nothing about how long the US Attorneys were given — so is that an honest mistake on your part, or a lie?
2. The WSJ journal said: “Ms. Reno gave them 10 days to move out of their offices.” Is there some question that they weren’t given 10 days to resign in writing? So a third became the interim US attorney, so what? They weren’t US attorney anymore. Was this due to an inability to replace them faster as opposed to the intent to replace them faster? And if the WSJ is “making up history” based on where their office was as opposed to what their office was, I think we’ve moved far beyond the realm of history.
How far down in the weeds do you want to go? Was Clinton replacing all the US attorneys any different in substance than every other President? No. Was the form different? Yes. So what. But the same authority that Clinton, and every other President, used to replace all the US Attorneys isn’t any different than the authority that Bush used to replace 8 during their terms.
===. McCarthy said nothing about how long the US Attorneys were given — so is that an honest mistake on your part, or a lie?
From McCarthy:One of President Clinton’s very first official acts upon taking office in 1993 was to fire every United States attorney then serving — except one, Michael Chertoff, now Homeland Security secretary but then U.S. attorney for the District of New Jersey, who was kept on only because a powerful New Jersey Democrat, Sen. Bill Bradley, specifically requested his retention.
C’mon. He’s only off by two months. When does someone become a liar instead of just careless? Stupid or dishonest? Which is better?
===2. The WSJ journal said: “Ms. Reno gave them 10 days to move out of their offices.” Is there some question that they weren’t given 10 days to resign in writing? So a third became the interim US attorney, so what? They weren’t US attorney anymore. Was this due to an inability to replace them faster as opposed to the intent to replace them faster? And if the WSJ is “making up history” based on where their office was as opposed to what their office was, I think we’ve moved far beyond the realm of history.
Let’s quote the WSJ
“As everyone once knew but has tried to forget, Mr. Hubbell was a former partner of Mrs. Clinton at the Rose Law Firm in Little Rock who later went to jail for mail fraud and tax evasion. He was also Bill and Hillary Clinton’s choice as Associate Attorney General in the Justice Department when Janet Reno, his nominal superior, simultaneously fired all 93 U.S. Attorneys in March 1993. Ms. Reno–or Mr. Hubbell–gave them 10 days to move out of their offices.”
They weren’t given 10 days to move out of their offices. They had to submit letters of resignation–the same thing the Bush administration did under Ashcroft–only a couple weeks earlier.
Quoting again:In fact, the dismissals were unprecedented: Previous Presidents, including Ronald Reagan and Jimmy Carter, had both retained holdovers from the previous Administration and only replaced them gradually as their tenures expired. This allowed continuity of leadership within the U.S. Attorney offices during the transition.
They were not unprecedented. Reagan and Bush did the same damn thing as did Carter and Nixon and probably Kennedy and Eisenhower, and…. Saying it was unprecedented is a lie and especially funny since Ashcroft did the same thing 2 weeks earlier in the Bush term. Again, this is information from a Polisci 101 course. To get it wrong in an editorial like this is lying. It’s making up history and not caring if anyone calls them on it.
===How far down in the weeds do you want to go? Was Clinton replacing all the US attorneys any different in substance than every other President? No. Was the form different? Yes. So what. But the same authority that Clinton, and every other President, used to replace all the US Attorneys isn’t any different than the authority that Bush used to replace 8 during their terms.
No, it wasn’t unprecedented. It was just more public. Comparing it to what Bush did with the 8 is dishonest and wrong. Bush did the same thing as Clinton in 2001, he just used the phrase transitioning. We now know Carol Lam was replaced 3 days after she sent a letter to Justice saying she was going after Dusty Foggo.
No one argues that the President doesn’t have the authority. I do argue, as many others do, this sort of firing over political prosecutions in the middle of a term is unprecedented. Given the administration hid what they were doing reasonably causes people to ask questions. Iglesias’ situation screams obstruction of justice and Lam’s is one of the most shocking abuses of power I’ve ever seen. Dusty Foggo likely leads to indictments of Jerry Lewis and other Republicans in the military procurement process and a whole can of worms with the CIA and the DOD including a prostitution ring and contractors with a limo company that kept getting contracts after the whole situation was revealed. Hell, if it goes deep enough it might snare Murtha even.
Essential to understanding this situation is the fact that, under the recently-renewed Patriot Act, Bush does not have to submit his replacement attorneys to the Senate for confirmation.
This means that, unlike ANY previous president, he has the power to oust dedicated, competent prosecutors and replace them with complete political hacks — with no oversight whatsoever.
And, SURPRISE! That’s just what he tried to do.
My wife is an attorney. The issue that is most worrying to those in the legal profession here is that there was active pressure from two Republican lawmakers (Senator Domenici of New Mexico, and a Congresswoman in New Mexico) on the U.S. Attorney in New Mexico to pursue politically motivated cases, and to hurry and do it before the November 2006 election. This could lead to the U.S. Attorney’s office becoming an arm of the party in power to pursue legal harassment of the opposition party. A VERY BAD IDEA.
[…] First and foremost, it’s important to understand that all 93 US Attorneys are appointed by the president. Usually, at the begining of a new Presidental party transition, it is CUSTOMARY to ask for all of them to hand in their resigination as part of the transition. Reagan did it in 1980. Clinton did it in 1993. George W. Bush did it in 2001. […]
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