Surprising precisely no one, the "administration" today moved to appeal the recent federal court ruling ordering Harriet Miers and Josh Bolten to appear before the House Judiciary Committee in response to their subpoenas.
Planning appeals, two senior White House advisers asked a judge Thursday to delay enforcement of his ruling that they have to testify before Congress.
White House chief of staff Joshua Bolten and former White House counsel Harriet Miers petitioned U.S. District Judge John Bates to place a hold on his ruling allowing White House aides to be subpoenaed by Congress.
Bates on July 31 rejected White House arguments that presidential confidants are protected from congressional subpoenas by executive privilege, giving free rein to Democrats who have been trying to get President Bush's aides to testify on the dismissal of nine federal prosecutors.
Obviously there's a good chance that this move runs out the clock on the issue, if the stay is granted. There's some indication from Bates' July 31st opinion that he's sensitive to the fact that the short time window a Congress has to enforce its subpoena power (House subpoenas expire with the adjournment of Congress at the end of its two-year term) has to be factored into the equation, but there's clearly no guarantee that Bates would deny the White House motion.
Without a stay in place, the Judiciary Committee would be looking to resume hearings with Miers and Bolten as witnesses in September, when the Congress returns from its August recess. Still unclear is exactly what happens if Miers and Bolten continue to refuse to appear even in the absence of a stay, or what recourse (if any) the House would have should they agree to appear, but decline to answer any questions on the grounds they originally claimed exempted them from having to show up -- that is, executive privilege.
Also still floating around out there somewhere: inherent contempt. Judge Bates did his best to discourage its use, preferring the use of the courts to settle these issues, if necessary. But a stay, should it be granted, would create incredible pressure on the Congress to resort to the very limited additional options open to it to enforce their rights before the issues were mooted by the end of its term.
Meanwhile, it's back to the waiting game for the House, now eyeing the close of the 110th Congress, the most important thing about winning the majority in which was supposed to be... "subpoena power."
In the wake of the favorable decision in the case of Committee on the Judiciary, U.S. House of Representatives v. Harriet Miers, et al., the Congress has its eye back on the "subpoena power" ball. The court's decision has done more than simply reaffirm that Harriet Miers and Josh Bolten must obey Congressional subpoenas (under penalty of exactly what, we still have not figured out). It may also have emboldened Congressional investigators and shaken loose some other exercises of the subpoena power that were waiting in the wings.
U.S. Rep. George Miller (D-CA), chairman of the House Education and Labor Committee, today demanded that Charles E.F. Millard, director of the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, immediately comply with a subpoena served July 16 by turning over documents regarding a report into the agency’s management and governance practices. The U.S. District Court today reaffirmed that the executive branch must comply with congressional subpoenas.
And this, via The Gavel, in the Government Oversight National Security and Foreign Affairs Subcommittee:
Subcommittee Chairman Tierney and Full Committee Chairman Waxman threaten Michael Dominguez, Principal Deputy Undersecretary for Defense, with contempt after he reveals that he has ordered Dr. Kaye Whitley of the DOD Sexual Assault Prevention and Response Office to defy a subpoena to appear
And of course, there's the Judiciary committee's recent vote to hold Karl Rove in contempt for his refusal to comply with their subpoena, but that came before the court's ruling.
But if the action in the committees this week is any indication of a wider reawakening of interest in the subpoena power, things could really break open, sending the full extent of the Bush "administration's" stonewalling of all outside oversight spilling into view at long last.
The chairman of a House committee has warned Attorney General Michael Mukasey he could be held in contempt of Congress if he doesn’t turn over documents from an FBI interview with Vice President Dick Cheney.
Back on June 20th, subscription only Congressional Quarterly reported that:
Panel Chairman Henry A. Waxman, D-Calif., is investigating the White House’s role in an EPA decision to bar California from regulating vehicle greenhouse gas emissions. Separately, the panel is investigating the EPA’s decision to set a new smog pollution standard less stringent than what scientific advisers recommended.
Waxman had scheduled a Friday hearing to hold two Bush administration officials in contempt for failing to produce documents he had requested in subpoenas. But he said he would hold off on the contempt vote after learning the White House had invoked executive privilege.
The two officials are Susan Dudley, administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs at the Office of Management and Budget; and EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson.
There's even growing realization among Bush's Republican shock troops on the Hill that this "administration's" games are endangering their own powers and prerogatives.
Over in the Intelligence Committee, as noted in yesterday's Midday Open Thread, there was this:
In an interview, Hoekstra, the committee's senior Republican, said he told McConnell that he was disgusted with what he described as the Bush administration's continuing effort to undercut any kind of outside oversight.
"This is part of a systemic problem of the administration, and I said I'm not going to take it anymore," Hoekstra said.
This isn't news to Hoekstra's fellow Republican, Dana Rohrabacher (though you won't find either of them doing anything about it):
"The disdain and uncooperative nature that this administration has shown toward Congress... is so egregious that I can no longer assume that it is simply bureaucratic incompetence or isolated mistakes. Rather, I have come to the sad conclusion that this administration has intentionally obstructed Congress’ rightful and constitutional duties."
The fact is that this "administration" has stonewalled dozens of investigations into nearly every department and agency within the executive branch. There are more than a dozen investigative committees and subcommittees in the House alone, and almost all of them could tell you stories about being stonewalled across multiple investigations by the Bush gang. In the Senate, the situation may be even worse, committee and floor rules make it even more difficult to issue and enforce subpoenas. Witness what happened to Senator Barbara Boxer's efforts to chase down EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson:
A vote on the issuance of a subpoena for the draft endangerment finding on global warming emissions rejected at the highest levels in the White House was stymied when Republican members boycotted the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works business meeting, preventing a quorum
And many of you will remember that the Senate Judiciary Committee also has a very old outstanding (and unenforced) subpoena out for Karl Rove, for the defiance of which the committee voted to hold him in contempt. But the Senate has never bothered to have a floor vote to make the contempt official. And how could they? Where would they get the 60 votes to shut down a filibuster of such a resolution?
So, does the Miers ruling mean the dam finally breaks, and a new flood of subpoenas previously bottled up by the uncertainty of the situation are now unleashed?
Unlikely, although such a deluge would constitute the first and only real demonstration of just how obstructionist the "administration" has been, across the board and on every issue. There's been no comprehensive accounting of just how many avenues of inquiry into just how many areas of critical importance to the American people have been thwarted by White House intransigence -- an intransigence that the federal courts have now joined in declaring to be without support in law or precedent. But it's still unlikely.
That's because the Congressional leadership has retained fairly tight control over how many subpoenas are issued, and how far investigators should go in pursuit of their inquiries. It's been part of the overall political strategy that had its origins in not giving rise to any kind of panic or fear of political vindictiveness -- which Republicans promised Americans would be the case if Democrats were returned to the majority -- stemming from the elections of 2006, and which has morphed into the overall political strategy of not giving rise to any kind of panic or fear of political vindictiveness that might stem from the upcoming elections of 2008.
Well, that and the fact that there are probably no more than a few weeks left of active session in the 110th Congress, with both houses in recess for the month of August, and the House still aiming at a September 26th adjournment for the year... so that they can come back home and ask for your votes. No doubt so that they may bring some accountability back to Washington.
That's life. And that's politics. The best we can hope for is that our votes buy us a respite from such overwhelming and dire need for oversight into such basic issues of governance such as, "does the executive branch have to obey the law?" Or, "what if they have to, but they just don't?"
We won't likely be getting any actual answers to those questions before we're all asked to forget about them "for the good of the country." Perhaps we'll enjoy it more than we now think just to have relief from having to ask for a few years.
Bushies squirm. We can do a little victory dance. No blanket immunity.
A federal judge ruled Thursday that Bush's advisers do not enjoy "absolute immunity" from congressional subpoenas. Nytimes.
"(Thursday’s) landmark ruling is a ringing reaffirmation of the fundamental principle of checks and balances and the basic American idea that no person is above the law," said Representative John D. Conyers.
Bush advisors must appear at the hearings, even if merely to refuse to answer questions. They can't just not go! And they must supply the requested documents.
PDF: US District Court Case Memorandum, 93pp.
As noted by the AP, and more importantly, by diarist hcc in VA, the court hearing the case filed by the House Judiciary Committee seeking enforcement of its subpoenas against Harriet Miers and Josh Bolten has ruled in favor of the committee. Miers and Bolten must appear, and must produce the documents sought and/or privilege logs describing the documents and any claims of privilege for them if they continue to withhold them.
Coming from a very conservative judge who has amassed a rather remarkable track record of deciding in favor of executive power and government secrecy, this is something of a pleasant surprise, although this is certainly the way we ought to have expected the law to be interpreted in less contentious times.
What's next?
Well, the option to appeal is still open. And that would certainly help run out the clock, which might be what the "administration" is after. And of course, their prior actions have given us cause to ask very basic questions about the enforcement of judicial decisions that used to be taken for granted. That is, although Judge Bates agrees that Miers and Bolten have no valid claims of privilege that would make them immune from subpoena, there's still the question of how to physically force them to appear if they simply continue to insist that they will not. Under ordinary circumstances (and this ruling, should it hold up, certainly gives us reason to believe we're moving closer to our old understanding of what ordinary circumstances are), enforcement could be had through a court order enforcing its decision, meaning that federal officers could compel appearance in compliance with the subpoenas. Those federal officers, of course, are actually part of the "unitary executive," and depending on just how crazy the upper echelons of this "administration" are, you could possibly see some... let's say... difference of opinion... about whose instructions ought to be followed in any enforcement action -- the court's, or the boss's.
Back here on Earth, though, the ruling(which I haven't had the chance to read through yet) will surely put the House, the Judiciary Committee and all other committees with pending subpoenas (or subpoenas awaiting action) on firmer ground if they encounter continued resistance. With Article III now on record as agreeing with Article I that Article II is in the wrong here, public opinion about more aggressive enforcement of Congressional subpoenas might take on a very different color. If a federal judge orders White House compliance and the "administration" continues to resist, the threat of inherent contempt might possibly seem a little less out of left field, and begin to look a little more like the Congress putting its foot down at long last to stop a White House that's running wild.
One final note from page one of the opinion:
The heart of the controversy is whether senior presidential aides are absolutely immune from compelled congressional process.
I note simply (again, before reading the opinion) that it has been Karl Rove's contention in connection with the subpoenas he's defied that he has "absolute immunity" from Congressional process. While Miers and Bolten have mostly framed their defiance in terms of "executive privilege" of varying stripes, Rove has made his case (such as it is) on the basis of some new invention he styles "absolute immunity." I'm hopeful that this decision will short-circuit his claims as thorough as it appears to have short-circuited those of Miers and Bolten.
Oh, and one more thing: Congress goes into recess at the end of this week, not to return until September, and after which the House aims to adjourn their session on September 26th. That effectively leaves three weeks of active session to actually do something with this ruling.
This just came out 12 minutes ago, so I'll just post the short AP summary, if that's ok with you:
WASHINGTON (AP) — A federal judge has sided with Congress in its fight with the Bush administration over whether top White House aides can be subpoenaed by Congress.
The House Judiciary Committee wants to question the president's chief of staff, Josh Bolten, and former legal counsel Harriet Miers, about the firing of nine U.S. attorneys.
But President Bush says they are immune from such subpoenas. They say Congress can't force them to testify.
U.S. District Judge John Bates said there's no legal support for that stance. He refused to throw out the case and said the aides can be subpoenaed.
Former White House adviser Karl Rove defied a congressional subpoena to testify Thursday about allegations of political pressure at the Justice Department, including whether he tried to influence the prosecution of a former Democratic governor of Alabama.
Rep. Linda Sanchez, chairman of the House subcommittee that called Rove, ruled with backing from fellow Democrats on the panel that Rove's claim of immunity was invalid -- perhaps the first step toward holding him in contempt for refusing to cooperate.
Hmm. The president and his advisors appear to be above the law. I wish we had been alerted earlier to the necessity of the legislative branch asserting its powers against the expanding executive, so as to preserve what's left of the Constitution's checks and balances. But everyone knows that every battle is a discrete and unconnected event floating in the vacuum of space, so what would be the difference even if someone had?
Ah, me!
Anyway, what happened was that Rove's lawyer wrote to the committee the other day to say he wasn't gonna show, and decline to appear "on the grounds that Executive Privilege confers upon him immunity from process to respond to a subpoena directed to this subject." That's a new one on me. Executive privilege not with respect to declining to answer specific questions or produce specific documents, but a new breed of executive privilege that manifests itself as an absolute immunity from Congressional subpoenas.
In today's "hearing" (for which no one showed up to be heard), subcommittee chair Linda Sanchez ruled Rove's assertion of the privilege to be without merit, which could be the first step toward holding him in contempt of Congress. Of course, Josh Bolten and Harriet Miers have both been held in contempt, and we already know what happened there: the Bush "administration" has instructed the US Attorney not to prosecute the case. And this is actually Rove's second subpoena. The Senate Judiciary Committee issued the first one a year ago, but Rove never showed for that one, either. The Committee then voted to hold Rove in contempt in December of last year, but there has never been a vote before the full Senate, which would be required to refer the charges to the same US Attorney who wouldn't prosecute Miers and Bolten.
But Rove's claim could perhaps add another layer of ridiculousness to these proceedings. He claims executive privilege, but the White House says nothing. So who's right? Has he been instructed to assert this newly invented kind of immunity/ privilege or not? Well, let's hold hearings to find out whether the White House told him to do it. Only the White House surely won't testify, no doubt claiming... executive privilege. And Double Secret Immunity, too, no doubt.
Perhaps it won't matter, in that the subcommittee has ruled the claim inapplicable in any case. But it'll make for interesting (and slow) litigation if Rove's lawyer moves to block the contempt citation by demanding that a court review the question of whether or not his claim of immunity was valid, and in the alternative whether good, old-fashioned executive privilege would have applied. Would a court review it, given that there's already been a Congressional determination on it? Would we have to litigate whether or not a court can review it before we even get to what they might or might not say about it? Would it all just run out the clock until the Congress adjourned and Bush left the White House?
Mind you, there's not that much clock left. The House's schedule adjournment date is September 26th, and for the first time in a long time, the House leadership is talking about actually sticking to it or close to it, with no lame duck session planned. Remember that even if lightning were to strike and the House were to go with inherent contempt, Rove could not be detained after the House adjourned sine die. If they do that on or about September 26th, well, you can figure out the rest. Can they adjourn informally and just have pro forma sessions every once in a while until January? Sure. And if they had Rove in jail, they doubtless would consider that.
Or maybe not. Perhaps it would be enough to assert the right to hold him for inherent contempt, keep him for a few days or even a few hours, and then adjourn. It wouldn't be very satisfying, but it would be a way to at least be clear about whether the power exists or not.
Anyway, Rove didn't show up, and he invented a totally new line of bullshit about why he didn't have to along the way. So that's just great. Have a nice day!
renewed their demand that former White House political adviser Karl Rove testify publicly on the politicization of the Justice Department but suggested they may accept a compromise in which Rove would be interviewed in private without taking an oath to tell the truth.
We were, of course, surprised to learn that Judiciary Dems considered this, "an important step forward," and that they were "encouraged by this suggestion."
Why would they say such a thing? Well, the thinking was that the "important step forward" was that Rove's offer didn't specifically preclude the later enforcement of a subpoena to compel sworn testimony, a key difference from a similar "offer" made on behalf of Harriet Miers and Josh Bolten last year. (Yes, they've been in defiance of their subpoenas for over a year now.)
Karl Rove has declined to testify before a House Judiciary subcommittee, despite a subpoena directing him to appear, his attorney told the committee on July 1.
Rove’s attorney, Robert Luskin, cited executive privilege as the reason that the former White House adviser would not appear before the Commercial and Administrative Law Subcommittee on July 10.
As I sarcastically implied, no surprise. And no important step forward, either. The offer to testify off-the-record without precluding later sworn testimony was not, as it turned out, an important change in the White House's position on compliance with Congressional subpoenas, but rather an additional degree of gamesmanship that lawyering up privately (rather than through the White House) allows you to employ. You have your private attorney float an offer that puts daylight between you and the White House's position, let it be hailed as "an important step forward," and then:
respectfully decline to appear before the Subcommittee on July 10 on the grounds that Executive Privilege confers upon him immunity from process to respond to a subpoena directed to this subject.
Voila! You're back to the White House position, and the House Judiciary Committee has to explain why the "important step forward" is now unacceptable.
It's not inexplicable, mind you. The grounds are these: Rove says he'll answer questions about the Don Siegelman matter only, and will refuse to discuss the broader U.S. Attorneys matter. So technically, it's this that the Committee is rejecting as unacceptable.
And it is unacceptable. Unfortunately, it also means the Rove subpoena ends up in limbo with the Miers and Bolten subpoenas, awaiting the outcome of a federal lawsuit filed by the Committee, begging the judicial branch to please allow the legislative branch to conduct oversight of the executive branch. Just as Rove himself said it would, back in May.
So what's next? Well, there's always what some Members of the Judiciary Committee say is next:
Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) said that the House Judiciary Committee would be willing to arrest Karl Rove if the former White House official doesn't testify about his role in the firing of nine U.S. attorneys in 2006.
That sure would go a long way toward making people believe in subpoena power. Not to mention the tantalizing suggestion offered and oft-repeated by certain Members of Congress that the new FISA revisions recently passed by the House still preserve the possibility of criminal prosecution of domestic spying abuses.
It's hard to buy into the criminal liability claim when the House has Rove, Miers and Bolten dead to rights, and... seeks civil relief. Don't you think?
A hearing was held Monday on the issue of Josh Bolten and Harriet Miers compliance with congressional subpoenas related to an investigation of fired U.S. prosecutors. The House Judiciary Committee filed a lawsuit in March to compel them to respond to subpoenas. U.S. District Judge John Bates heard arguments from Irvin Nathan, a chief lawyer for the House of Representatives, and Carl Nichols, a Justice Department attorney.
During the three hour long hearing, Nathan said, "Not only doesn't it have the facts from the White House, it has false and misleading facts from former members of the Department of Justice." Nichols said Bolten and Miers have immunity and can't be compelled to testify about confidential advice they provided Bush.
U.S. District Judge John Bates, a Bush appointee said "Both sides have shown a little bit of intransigence," and "silliness."
(Washington, DC)- Today, House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers, Jr. (D-MI) issued a subpoena to former White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove for testimony about the politicization of the Department of Justice (DOJ), including former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman’s case. Yesterday, Rove’s attorney, Robert Luskin, sent a letter to the Committee expressing that Rove would not agree to testify voluntarily, per the Committee’s previous requests.
The bad news comes in two parts:
In case you've forgotten, Karl Rove's already been subpoenaed. A year ago. By the Senate Judiciary Committee. Never testified. Never held in contempt. So how scared do you think he is this time?
It was also about a year ago that the House Judiciary Committee subpoenaed Harriet Miers and Josh Bolten. Their testimony was demanded and refused over a series of sliding deadlines over July of last year. A year later, neither one has testified, or even shown up at a hearing in person to say why they refuse to testify.
What ever happened with those subpoenas? Well, the full House voted to hold both Miers and Bolten in contempt of Congress, and referred the charges to the U.S. Attorney for prosecution. The U.S. Attorney told the House to go jump in the lake. The House did the next best thing, voting to authorize the Judiciary Committee to file suit to enforce the subpoenas.
It's what you do before your summer recess, you know? You put the hot stuff out there so you can brag on it while you're at home in your district, or doing appearances on progressive talk radio shows.
I mean, you tell me if you think Karl's sweating it.
In 1934, Postmaster General MacCracken was held in contempt of the Senate and served a 10-day jail sentence. He proceeded to file a habeas corpus petition, asking to be released on the grounds that Congress didn't have the authority to imprison someone for contempt outside of a normal criminal proceeding. In a landmark decision that has all kinds of applications to today's political environment, the Supreme Court disagreed, setting the stage for today's House of Representatives to imprison people like Harriet Miers and Joshua Bolten for contempt of Congress with or without the cooperation of President Bush and the Department of Justice.
Just one day after Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia told Americans to "get over" the 2000 decision that handed the presidency to George W. Bush, the Supreme Court today rubber stamped an essential tactic in the all-out Republican war to suppress the turnout of minority - and likely Democratic - voters. By a 6-3 vote, the Court upheld an Indiana voter identification law purportedly designed to address what most experts deem a non-existent problem. By so doing, the Roberts Court has guaranteed that the GOP's strategy of divide, suppress and conquer is alive and well in 2008.
Roland Martin, a regular CNN contributor (and the one that I personally find the the most tolerable of the whole CNN bunch), finally calls out the ridiculousness of accusing different presidential candidates of being elitist. He especially calls out the Republican party's hypocrisy on the issue. Their argument that Democrats are elitist, while they are just men of the people is tired and false.
We have all been making this argument on this site for a while now, but someone in the media finally appears to be paying attention. I will have a lot more on Roland's commentary, which goes on the skewer both the Republican party and the mainstream media for their phony charges of elitism, right after the jump.
So, I'll be heading out to San Jose tomorrow for the California Democratic Party Convention, the largest gathering of uncommitted superdelegates outside the US Capitol. Bill Clinton will be there on Sunday pitching woo and it should be interesting seeing the establishment and grassroots politicos in the context of the primary pie fight.
But before that, I wanted to highlight this incredible excerpt from Eric Lichtblau's upcoming book Bush's Law: The Remaking of American Justice. Lichtblau and his partner James Risen won a Pulitzer for breaking the illegal warrantless wiretapping story in late 2005. But they had the story over a year earlier, and were rebuffed from going to print due to the Administration's intimidation of New York Times editors. In this excerpt Lichtblau recounts the story when Bush sends in the big guns to try and kill the story once and for all. You really sense how they work as a kind of loanshark operation rather than an executive branch:
On Saturday night, George W. Bush showed once again that his sense of humor, and not his dull eyes, provides a window into his soul. It provides Americans with rare, fleeting glimpses into the dark and twisted character of a man who views with disdain the citizens he was elected to serve. If Presidents Kennedy and Reagan turned to self-deprecating humor to charm the press and disarm critics, in Bush's hands the joke is both a weapon to attack enemies and a shield to fend off accountability. His appearance this weekend at the Gridiron Club was no exception.
Just saw this on BBC, and came to Dkos to see if it where being discussed. Surprisingly I didn't see it anywhere, but I guess it has been a big news day. Nonetheless, enjoy.
Apparently congress filed suit against Harriet Miers and Joshua Bolton claiming that they must testify to congress. As BBC states:
The lawsuit filed by the House Judiciary Committee contests the White House's view that Ms Miers is immune from being held to testify by Congress.
It also calls on Ms Miers and Mr Bolten to identify all the documents being withheld from Congress despite the subpoena issued by it early last year.
And to no ones surprise:
White House spokeswoman Dana Perino responded: "The confidentiality that the president receives from his senior advisers and the constitutional principle of separation of powers must be protected from overreaching and we are confident that the courts will agree with us."
It will be interesting to see how this plays out; hopefully this will inspire some more action in congress because the courts are likely to take their sweet time in deciding this.
Following the refusal of the Department of Justice to prosecute contempt of Congress charges against Harriet Miers and Josh Bolten, the House Judiciary Committee has filed suit in federal court, seeking to enforce their subpoenas.
From a committee press release:
The Judiciary Committee, as plaintiff, is asking the Court to find the following:
(1) Ms. Miers is not "immune" from the obligation to appear before the Committee in response to a duly authorized, issued and served Committee subpoena;
(2) Ms. Miers and Mr. Bolten must produce privilege logs identifying all documents withheld on grounds of executive privilege;
(3) Executive privilege does not cover documents not involving the President or undertaken directly in preparation for advising the President or whose contents are widely-known, previously released or previously the subject of extensive, authorized testimony, and that Ms. Miers’s and Mr. Bolten’s claims of executive privilege are, in any event, overcome by the Committee’s compelling need for the subpoenaed testimony and documents.
(4) that Ms. Miers is required to appear before the Committee to respond to questions put to her pertinent to the Investigation and to invoke executive privilege only if and when appropriate;
(5) that Ms. Miers and Mr. Bolten are required to provide, as required by the subpoenas, a detailed privilege log, identifying by author, recipient, date and subject matter those documents responsive to the subpoena that have been withheld on executive privilege grounds;
(6) that Ms. Miers and Mr. Bolten are required to produce all non-privileged documents responsive to the subpoenas.
The case has been assigned D.C. District Court Judge John D. Bates.
It's a shame that this took so long, because it's this very process, where charges and investigations slowly cook and escalate that can lead to something starting with the letter "I".
You know that letter "I", the one that has been 'taken off the table'.
Mukasey's ridiculous assertions, that lawyers operating under the protection of the Executive can do no wrong, and the implied acceptance that Executive actors when advised by these same lawyers can take bad advice and create 'facts on the ground', without recourse or oversight of of Congress .. are claims of power beyond irony.
Mukasey's claims are beyond irony, and it is treason to the concepts of the Separation of Powers, as outlined in our Constitution.
Attorney General Michael Mukasey has refused to refer Congressional contempt citations against Harriet Miers and Joshua Bolton to a District of Columbia grand jury.
Mukasey said Bolten and Miers were right in ignoring subpoenas to provide Congress with White House documents or testify about the firings of federal prosecutors.
"The department will not bring the congressional contempt citations before a grand jury or take any other action to prosecute Mr. Bolten or Ms. Miers," Mukasey wrote Pelosi.
